Ringing the Changes II
by Chya
Summary: In a dark future, hope comes from an unlikely source
1. Month 0

Notes: Have used gender as commonly used in anime for Dale. (S/he, hir.) 

I have to give hoooj hugs, kudos, thanks and general gratitude and appreciation to JillyW for magnificent beta job, and giving so much time and patience to do it. Especially translating parts in trans-orbital Chya-ese. All remaining mistakes are mine!

This is the second and final part of this story. 

***** **Ringing the Changes Part 2**

By Chya

The Middle 

Five rings there were, five rings of those with power, those that led all others.

They lay alone, untouched by the living since their bearers laid them to rest deep within a mountain as the world waged a war of human versus mutant. A short war, but vicious and decimating, no side able to take the mantle of black or white, all battling in shades of gray.

The mutant rebellion had been quashed. The ferals killed or caged, the moleculars enslaved in mines and quarries whose automated robotics had been destroyed. Elementals kept tethered in power stations and factories, providing the energy for humans to function, live and rebuild, while psionics and those with other powers too dangerous, or which simply didn't have any practical application, were killed out of hand in the global freak farms.

For once, humankind was united in a hatred that would last as long as the planetary desolation, and destruction that would last as long as there were mutants to exploit and destroy.

For those very few renegades and outlaws of both human and mutant kind who still believed in the right to live, a legend was growing, the story of a small, elusive group who even before the war, as well as during, helped mutants to escape horrific fates and to integrate into civilized society with humans who accepted who and what they were. A group who fought tenaciously for the right of mutants to live in peace alongside humans. Legend said that only the plain silver ring they wore could identify a member of that group. 

But the rings had been carefully abandoned as their bearers chose to go different ways, take different paths, each believing they were fighting for peace and equality, yet never quite able to reconcile and unite through their own differences.

Now, the war was over and exactly a year had passed since the rings had been buried here beneath the ruins of Sanctuary. And one person took it upon himself to find each ring bearer and return the band of silver to them.

He was a man of no side at all, a man who, in the far distant past, had been scarred and beaten yet survived to rule is own ruthless empire. A man who was not quite human, yet not quite mutant.

A man who, before the war, had been known as Mason Eckhart but, now that it was over, no longer had a name to call his own. 

*****


	2. Month 1

The End + Month 1 

Proxy Blue still retained her near black colouring and expressionless face, as she had done consistently for the last couple of months. "Everything may have stabilised on the surface, but mutant mania is still alive and well. With the majority of mutants in custody and the remaining gone to ground, jobs that had been created at the beginning of the war are now under threat. If you're not a mutant, then think about whether you could be considered a mutant collaborator, and yes, giving a mutant the time of day once does count. If you're not squeaky clean, be very afraid. Not even the secret services are safe. Two of the FBI's finest have been taken for questioning and four in the CIA. We're verging on something approaching the Salem witch trials or the McCarthy hearings so watch your backs whoever you are. And don't forget, if you have news, people need to know."

*****

"Gossip among the staff has it that you've been working overtime in the library, Adam. Anything interesting?" 

"Just research, William," Adam smiled. "Trying to figure out a vaccine to stop any more anomalies being born."

Morrisen raised an eyebrow, and almost dropped his cigar. "Anomalies? I'd rather thought they could be better termed as, ah, exploitative resources. We want them contained, not destroyed."

"Like Victoria has her exploitative resource on a dog leash? Literally? That, William, is where we must differ. Look at the amount of pain and suffering they've caused. It was my mistake that caused it all, and it's my responsibility to eradicate that mistake. The good news for you is that it'll be a very long time before anything effective can be produced. Unless I have access to somewhere like Genomex or LexMor, I'm starting from scratch."

"I wish I could help," Morrisen sighed, "but it would be politically very unwise to be seen having business relations with you outside the Inner Circle. People might get all sorts of wrong impressions. A Senator who has always been anti-mutant, consorting with the creator of said unfortunates? You can see where I'm coming from."

"Yes, William," Adam smiled through gritted teeth. "I can see exactly where you're coming from."

*****

Seven young women sat in a circle with their backs to the central column that connected them all together. The chairs were comfortable and although the probes that surrounded their heads kept them immobile, they were not painful.

They could only ever work in unison but were never permitted contact, each having their own area partitioned off with reflective glass. Opposite the chair, each had a small cubicle that contained a bed and necessary facilities, and there were always fresh meals waiting when the machine released them.

None of the young women knew what the others so much as looked like, but their knowledge of each other was far more intimate than the designers of the machine, Genomex, could ever have imagined.

Very rarely, if one of them became ill or injured, they would be replaced as quickly as possible with another of the same or similar function and the rest of the Circle would compensate for the new one's strengths and weaknesses. It seemed that replacements were hard to find as it usually took days before the new girl was in place, and during these times the six who were waiting would be taken individually to the gym, the pool or the garden. Their owner was most concerned that his Psionic Circle remain as healthy as possible outside the machine, which in turn monitored their vitals at all times that they were connected.

The seven functions covered all the usual psionic bases, projection, precognition, illusion, kinetic, cyber, empath, and telepath and, when combined, they could accomplish so much more than as individuals. Both their shields and their influence had a strength and range that expanded exponentially according to each woman's power, and with psionic beacons at strategic points they could form a psionic web that covered half a continent.

The power, the feelings that came to each woman were addictive. None had wanted to be here, only accepting it to stave off an otherwise inevitable execution, but once they'd had a taste of the machine they never wanted to leave.

And Emma de Lauro was no exception. 

*****

Lena McEnery stared hard at her partner's empty chair, willing him to barge in and fill it with his big black lanky frame.

She'd been willing the same thing for the last few weeks to no avail. He'd been taken down for questioning related to an unspecified crime and he was still down there. It was far, far too long.

Just as she was thinking that exact same thought for the thousandth time that day, two of her colleagues came in with empty boxes. Their eyes showed sympathy, but their postures and curt words told her that they were strictly on company business.

"We're here to clear Agent Johnson's desk. Please don't touch anything and please don't interfere."

Darius wasn't coming back then. "Sure, I'll get out of your way, need to grab a sandwich anyway." She slipped her coat on. "Left it a little late if you're looking for evidence. He been sent home?"

"Orders. Agent Johnson has been detained indefinitely," she was told calmly.

"Shit! What the hell is going on around here!" she muttered. "Look, I'll see you later. Second thoughts, I may just hit the bar."

Just slightly harried looking, Lena left the building and headed home. She was well aware that if Darius was in closed custody then, as his partner, she would be being watched. That was standard operating procedure. She'd been living under that assumption since Darius had been escorted from the office, although he obviously hadn't told them a huge amount or they'd have been all over her apartment by now.

She just needed to get out from under the eye of the Bureau, then she could make a run for it. Having spent the last seventeen years as a field agent, and damned good one, she knew how they worked and was able to escape any surveillance coolly and calmly, so that they didn't know she was gone until after the fact.

Fortunately, in order to keep the little secret she and Darius shared, she only needed her Palm Pilot. Her home PC was clean, and she'd already ensured that Darius' Pilot couldn't get access to their hidden server. Having a good idea that they were just waiting for her to lead them to it, she resigned herself to being on the run. 

*****

With his rational mind hiding away so that it wouldn't have to acknowledge the dirt and dust and microscopic living things that were crawling all over the vehicle, Eckhart persuaded Wally to lend him his old Roadster, complete with a tank full of gas. It was enough to get him out to Langley's country residence and back, a place he'd been to on one or two occasions when he'd been in favour. He didn't dare visit while she was there, and was reluctantly prepared to camp out in the clapped out old banger for a couple of days at least.

As luck would have it, however, he passed her car on its way from the estate and since he only saw the chauffeur and Langley herself, he was reasonably certain that the Kilmartin boy would be inside the house still.

He'd scoured the news as carefully as possible given his lack of computer access, and Kilmartin had appeared here and there accompanying Langley to one function or another, a showpiece that she trotted out on every public occasion. Of the other three members of the defunct Mutant X there was no sign, and he was not yet prepared to deal with Adam.

Straightening himself up as much as possible, he prepared to bully his way into the small mansion.

Jesse was working out when the bemused butler came to tell him he had a visitor. Raymond, who'd followed the butler up, suggested that Jesse showered, changed and met his guest in the living room, and Jesse nodded and smiled, grateful that someone had control of the situation.

Without Victoria he was lost, and wasn't used to having to make decisions for himself. Wasn't normally permitted to. With Raymond apparently in control, he decided that this was one of the handler's refresher tests. The quiet man did that occasionally to make sure Jesse didn't need any further training, something he abhorred intensely.

Half an hour later he entered the living room to find his guest using the computer in the corner. He wasn't sure he liked this visitor using it because it was his. Victoria had given it to him as a present. But since he wasn't allowed to make a fuss, he waited patiently for his guest to notice him.

Maybe fifteen minutes passed before the stranger turned slightly and jumped violently as he spotted Jesse. "Er, Mr Kilmartin, there you are."

Jesse just stared at him. The man was scruffy and dirty, the thick scarf covering his face falling down to reveal a tired, haggard face with broken glasses. And his **skin -** it wasn't just peeling, but blistering and broken out in sores. It looked painful, and made him feel sick. 

"Mr Kilmartin, I er, I know we've not exactly been on the, er, same side of the fence, as it, er, were…" The man kept touching his temple, and squinting as if battling some internal force. "But I, ah, came to persuade you to take up, er, to take back control of, uh, well, you know, your, ah, electronic highway robbery mantle, er, am I making any sense?"

Jesse blinked and decided that the man was clearly insane. "Not really," he said carefully, wondering what repercussion might eventuate for his lack of understanding.  Victoria could be vicious, but her anger rarely lasted more than a few moments and her contrition made it all better. Raymond's anger was far more enduring and hurt less, but for a lot longer.

"Do, er, do you know who I am?" the strange man asked, coming closer. Jesse flinched from him, but stood his ground. "Mason Eckhart? Genomex?" A long pause, then. "Adam Kane?" 

"No." Jesse really didn't like this man, and didn't like this test because he didn't understand it. Didn't know what was expected of him, and he'd learned that not knowing was never a good thing.

Eckhart looked closely at him for a long time, making Jesse very uncomfortable. "You need to come, er, to come with me…" he started, but trailed off uncertainly, rubbing at his head with gloved fingers.

"I can only go with Victoria," Jesse told him matter-of-factly. That should explain everything, but he felt the urge to clarify. "I don't want to go anywhere unless it's with Victoria." Because in a world where his wants and needs were dictated by someone else, that was the only thing he was sure of.

There was a long awkward silence, before the strange man turned on his heel and headed for the door. 

Then a hand on Jesse's shoulder made him stiffen in apprehension.

"Good boy," Raymond said softly, and Jesse smiled in deep relief.

*****

Shalimar woke to the smell of frying food, and for the first time in a long time, her stomach grumbled. Paulo laughed at the clear sound and took a plate from the cook, offering it to her. Fever and deprivation had taken their toll on her formerly fit body, although she was working hard to rectify that, and she took the plate with a grateful smile, pulling herself upright against the tent wall to eat it.

The men who had pulled her out of the bloody cesspit had taken care of her pretty well. They were nomadic, and well practised in some of the medical arts alongside some excellent ranger skills.  Fortunately, the two bullets that hit her arm and thigh barely scraped muscle, but it was the infections that had caused the fever, though chances were she'd already been sick from the conditions of the place before the massacre.

They'd looked after her as one of their own and she hadn't yet figured out why, didn't know why they hadn't dumped her body, or left her at one of the aid-stations. They'd taken and burned all the bodies at the prison in one long funeral pyre, but any compassion she might have thought her rescuers had died when they told her brutally frankly that to leave that many corpses rotting in one place was to invite disease and pestilence to the area. Better the place be cleansed and used by others another day.

One of the most peculiar things about the men, other than that there were no women with them, was that they had never knowingly met a mutant. There simply weren't any in this part of South America or, if there were, they were few and far between. They'd assumed that the bodies they'd burned, because they all looked human, having been neutralised, **were** human.

They'd had to ask what the thing was in the back of her neck and, slightly out of it at the time, she'd told them honestly. They'd laughed at her, told her that she was too pretty to be a monster. 

Paulo came and sat at the far side of the tent to eat his meal. No one came close to her unless she knew they were coming since she'd damned near ripped the well-meaning cook's arm out. She'd clearly marked out her territory, and disliked anyone crossing into it, insecure in both body and mind. The only person she tolerated anywhere near was Paulo; he'd been with her when she was delirious and shown her nothing but respect.  He was nearly as tall as Brennan and as fit, but darker, smoother, like he should be in silk Armani hosting a dinner party on some rich hacienda, and he led this group of nomads. 

And with the way he smiled at her, maybe she did have an inkling why they'd looked after her, after all.

*****


	3. Month 2

+ Month 2 

"Do you ever feel that what you're feeling isn't quite what you think you should be feeling? Exactly where are the camps the psionics were sent to? Photographs were leaked to the New York Times yesterday showing that well-known shadowy Senator, William Morrisen, having lunch with one of the co-founders of the mutant age, along with older evidence of cosy chats with the other co-founder, Mason Eckhart. In a press release today, he explained his covert meetings away as strictly business, smoothing out the takeover of Genomex, and, with Eckhart's subsequent disappearance, taking advice from Kane on dispersal of assets. But, you know what? Nobody cares. Keep the stories coming, I need the excitement." 

*****

Emma loved to fly.

Without having to rely on mechanical craft that could let her down, send her plummeting to the ground, she was free to fly as took her fancy. Six ghosts at her side took strength from her, but gave it back tenfold in differing ways. With the solid shield around her, she could pick and choose the minds that she wanted to play with. 

They weren't real to her, not tangible human beings, but rather programmable puppets awaiting commands from her and her sisters. Joined, they shared each others skills and she knew what it was to slide through cables and dance with bytes as Cyber did.  And not only could she feel emotions, or push a man to love a woman, she could draw on Path's skills to put words in his mouth, or Kin's to put a flower in his hand. The seven of them played in the realm of the psi, laughing, having fun and playing tricks at whim, flitting from one puppet to the next and back, or flying through mindscapes that defied description. 

A blip and one of her tagged puppets seemed to be having a spike of guilt and trepidation. Cog looked and confirmed what the puppet's current line of fate would do. The owner would need to know about this so, using Path's link to him, Emma told him that Adam Kane was plotting. 

The returning spike of anger fuelled her own anger, and she felt her sisters unite in their shared rage. The owner did not appreciate the work they did for him. He supplied the machine, but they were so much more than the metal and wires that held them, and while he'd given them a freedom he didn't know, he was keeping them captive.

Growing in strength as each day went by, the Psionic Circle nurtured their resentment and rage towards their owner, knowing that the day would soon be upon them that they'd have their revenge. But until then, they were slaves to that owner's whim.

*****

All men in white coats looked the same and Eckhart found that that was no different when it came to scientific engineers in power stations. He liked the white coat he'd stolen. It had clearly been laundered in a sterile unit, and it was **clean**. A surgical mask had helped to disguise his face enough that the scabs weren't noticeable, and a stolen pass ensured he had a certain freedom of movement through the place.

The brief time he'd been able to gain on the computer at Langley's place had been invaluable. It had surprised him greatly at the time that parental controls had been put in place for the Kilmartin boy, but that had made sense as soon as he'd realised that while the boy's lights were on, clearly no one was home. All he'd done whilst on that machine was transfer some cash from a small Genomex slush fund, normally reserved for field agents' ad-hoc expenses, that no one had seen fit to block him from. He'd wired it to himself, and now had a modest apartment and a desktop with net access.

His subsequent research showed no sign of any of the three girls that he needed, but using his rusty hacking skills he'd managed to track Brennan Mulwray down to this plant. He even had a grid number for Mulwray, even if he wasn't entirely sure what a grid number was.  

He soon found out, and actually admired the design of the place. Not nearly as efficient as he could have done, of course, but it was passable and kept beautifully sterile. Discovering that the grid number gave him the exact location of Mulwray's pod, he shut it down and unlocked it. 

"Oh joy," he muttered, having no idea how to transport Mulwray out and thinking that perhaps this should be regarded as a dry run, that maybe he could find a couple of convenient thugs and come back tomorrow. It wasn't as if the place was exactly high security. "The last one was insensible and this one's incapable. Things are never easy, are they?"

"'M not incapable," Brennan muttered.

"Oh, more joy, it speaks." Eckhart couldn't help himself.

Brennan really couldn't drag up the energy or brainpower for wit today. He recognised Eckhart, and he recognised that not only was the pod open, but that the horrible 'nails on a blackboard' excruciatingly violent sucking of his electrical energy had vanished. It left him weak and cold and shaking and fucking exhausted. 

He didn't give a shit why Eckhart was letting him out, just accepted that he was. And if the man wanted him to walk out of here on legs that didn't know which way was up, then by God, he'd do it.

Anything to get out of that pod of horrors.

*****

"I need to get out of here," Shalimar told Paulo, looking about the forest as though a cab might pull up at any second.

"No, no, Chiquita, you cannot leave me," Paulo told her. "You will stay here, and you will come to care for me in time."

"What?" Shalimar screeched. This was the first time something like that had been said. "You can't keep me here, and certainly not for… not for **that**. I'm not yours, I don't belong to anyone!"

"Calm down," Paulo said to the young woman whose eyes were blazing gold in fury as she backed away from him. She wouldn't touch him if she could help it, couldn't touch anyone without feeling dead blood crawling over her skin, but she would do just about anything for her freedom.

"Ah, but Chiquita, you must see my problem. I have seen you naked, and in my culture that makes you mine. Now, I am not a bad man, and do not believe it is wise to force a woman. To the contrary, I believe a woman should be cherished, for she will bear my children. But you must believe that you **are** mine."

"No!" Pushed by words into angry reflex, faster than humanly possible, Shalimar had her arm round his throat and his gun at his head. "I will not be anyones! I have spent the last few years of my life fighting for my freedom and rights as a mutant. I will not now be chained for being a woman!" 

The other men in the camp were looking, drawing back from her in fear, and it slowly dawned on Shalimar that she was seeing detail, extreme detail as she did when her feral nature came to the fore. Her eyes must be gold, scaring them, and she must have moved feral fast, maybe growled.  But whatever, she'd scared them. The governor must have given up the ghost, because though she could still feel the ache at her neck her powers were back.

She tightened her grip, frightened that they'd try and cage her with more than words.

"Relax, Chiquita," Paulo said eventually with a long sigh. "You have made your point and I will help you get back to fight your fight."

Considering a moment, she decided that he'd been brutally honest with her so far and there no reason to think that might have changed. She started to let him go, but then realized what it was she held in her hand, saw the blood and the gray crawling up her hands and arms.  She dropped the firearm, scratching at her skin to get rid of it, but it was trying to crawl up over her shoulder, across her neck  and into her mouth, threatening to drown her.

And then Paulo was there, holding her arms, preventing her from hurting herself. He couldn't know what she saw, but he told her it wasn't real and, as she had many times over the last few weeks, she believed him and sank weakly to the ground.

*****

Langley watched Jesse working out from the doorway. He really was a lovely sight and an absolutely perfect toy to take to functions, always at her side, quiet, polite and echoing her opinions, performing tricks as she bade him. But so many others had pet mutants these days, and the fact that hers was not only from one of the East Coast Families but also rumoured to have founded the renegade Cyberteam was growing stale. 

And more than that, she was bored. He didn't have a mind of his own and she was getting sick of the constant agreement. One of the main reasons she'd gone into politics was the love of debate, of being challenged, and it wasn't like she had much other stimulating company in her household. Except Raymond, but he always smelled of dogs.

She wished Jesse were more like Noah had been.

Or rather, she wished that Raymond hadn't had to train the spirit out of him. At her summoning, Raymond appeared next her, and she voiced her complaints.

"You want a man who knows himself," he said quietly. "Not him."

She sighed and nodded. "Of course I do, but what man in his right mind would look twice at this old hag?" 

A shadow of longing passed so quickly over Raymond's face that she wondered if she'd seen it at all. He nodded at Jesse who was bench pressing under the watchful eye of his trainer. "You can have a man or you can have a dog. There is no in between."

"Perhaps a feral?" she snorted. "I'd hoped that giving him limited computer access might instigate some interest in something other than me. Because while it's very flattering, it's also very tiresome."

"I'm sorry ma'am, but there's nothing left of his mind." Raymond did sound truly apologetic. "Perhaps a telepath could make some modifications, but my teleblocks block all or nothing."

"I know, Raymond, I know. He was a computer geek before, so try teaching him some IT skills the same way you taught him to love me, would you? Perhaps he can learn."

"I can but try, Ma'am," Raymond sighed, and they both knew that it would make no difference.

*****

Lena knocked on the door of a woman that she was certain was part of Cyberteam. An androgynous young person answered with punk spiked hair and what, to her eye, looked like denim rags. The instant she asked for Nora251, however, the punk tried to close the door on her.

Used to such moves, Lena already had the door wedged open and, as the punk gave way, slipped inside herself, closing the door. The punk was halfway out the bathroom window when Lena grabbed the belt of her jeans and pulled her back.

"I need to see Nora 251 because I need help, and only the kind of help that Cyberteam can give me."

After a moment, the punk spoke warily. "S'me." Nora looked her up and down critically. "Cyberteam ain't around anymore."

"Now I know that's not true because I've been talking to you," Lena said, folding her arms.

Nora wiped her nose with the back of her hand. "Well, who are you anyway?"

Lena bit her lip as she considered. She'd never spoken of this to anyone but Darius, and felt as if she were about to expose herself naked in Times Square. But as she was asking Nora to come clean she could only offer the same in return.

"You use a dedicated mailbox for communication with us that we assigned you. CBT176287."

Nora's eyes widened in shock. "You're Proxy Blue?"

*****


	4. Month 3

+ Month 3 

Proxy Blue's image was back to the blue with the smug half smile. "What's going on out there, people? My mailboxes are practically empty. With the extended outbreak of 'not very much going on anywhere', this girl is thinking that maybe it's time for a vacation. Lemme see, Cuba, Kuwait, Mali, oh wait, no. I'm trying to holiday **away** from a dictatorship. What happened to democracy? Does anyone even know where the Constitution's kept these days? If anyone got off their fat asses long enough to gossip, there'd be rumours of Prozac in the water supply. Come on, you guys, I need to bitch!"

*****

Lena grinned at Nora. She'd been using the backup server for the last few weeks, just in case she was being traced. But now that she felt secure, she'd accessed the main server. The only thing missing was Darius. In some ways it was a good thing that there wasn't so much mail coming in, or she'd never have been able to handle it by herself before hooking up with Nora. She'd collate and verify all the snippets then Darius, with his talent for ad-hoc speeches, provided the wit, sarcasm and innuendo that Proxy was known for. Nora was better than she could ever have hoped for, but she wasn't Darius. That said, her tech skills made Darius' look like pre-school.

There was a huge unexpected bonus of Proxy Blue hooking up with a Cyberteam unit. By using some snippets that Proxy had picked up over the last year or so, and putting them together with clues embedded in Nora's system, they picked up a cache of data that could only have come from the Cyberteam Central Control. 

It had taken Nora a while to decrypt it, and in the end it turned out to be just a glorified signpost, pointing the way to different caches with different types of data. Nothing meant anything to Lena, but Nora was quite convinced that one of the pointer's was meant for any Cyberteam member.  What amused Nora, as she got further in, was that there was a coded list of all the Cyberteam members, with a risk rating. It seemed that the less the team leader had trusted you, the harder it was to break the encryption. And, while Nora wasn't the most trusted, she was only a short way down the list so it was relatively easy for her gain access. Both women were amazed at the size of Cyberteam. Being so tightly compartmentalized, Nora had thought there were only a handful of them working. With over a hundred units initially, and nearly a hundred still running, it was somewhat less surprising as to why Cyberteam had kept going, albeit somewhat fragmented.

And every last one would respond to the one who gave them the all clear as the new Central Control.

*****

It was quite by accident that Adam discovered a familiar figure sitting by the small indoor pond, meditating. At first he thought it was just a case of déjà vu, yet couldn't resist looking closer. 

"Hello, Adam." Emma greeted him coolly without opening her eyes, and her bodyguard stepped in front of her to prevent him getting any nearer.

"Emma." Adam was stunned. "What are you, I mean…" He trailed off, mind in a whirl. He'd thought she'd been sent to one of the freak farms and hadn't expected to see her again, least of all here.

"Surprised to see me?" Emma said, still cool and calm, without moving. "Thought I was dead?"

"I- uh,"

"Shows how wrong you can be," she continued.

"What's going on here?" Morrisen suddenly thundered into the area. 

"This man is bothering me, sir." Emma said. "Can I go back now?"

Morrisen nodded at the bodyguard who escorted the psionic away, and Adam looked inquiringly at the other man.

"You know full well that I think mutants have their uses," Morrisen snapped, "so don't look at me like that." 

"And how do I, do we know she's not manipulating us right now?" Adam's increasingly short temper was beginning to fray.

"You don't," Morrisen told him. "But I do. And I will promise you, Kane, that if I let them fuck with your mind, I'll make damned sure it's hard and fast."

"You're too generous." Sarcastic, but backing down, as Morrisen held all the advantages. He was playing a dangerous game, each man disliking the other but needing him, the one for his knowledge, the other for his power.

"Them? You have more than one?" Adam asked. 

"A small circle," replied Morrisen, lighting up a cigar. "But I want you to forget all about it. Now, I've been considering, and I think I might be able to get you into a small cubby hole in LexMor."

Funny how fast some people could change their minds, thought Adam, but said, "That's wonderful, thank you so much."

*****

Brennan had slept for a long time after they'd made their escape from the power station. Although escape might've been glorifying it a little since it was simply a case of no one stopping them as they hobbled out. One guard had waved a gun around, but Eckhart had remarked that he really didn't want to do that. The guard had shrugged, said okay, put his gun away and gone back to looking at his HotXtream magazine.

Passing out in the car, Brennan had no recollection of getting to the bed in the large third story apartment. But he did know that Eckhart was not exactly the world's best nurse, working on the principle that when Brennan was hungry enough he'd come looking. 

Which was why, after three straight days, Brennan had woken up weak as a kitten on top of the still twitching skin and monumental headache. But Eckhart had been right, inasmuch as Brennan had helped himself to whatever he could get his hands on and took himself back to bed for another day of perhaps more normal sleep.

When he'd awoken properly he'd almost felt back to normal, apart from odd muscle spasm. The apartment he was in, however, was most peculiar. It was spacious; he found three bedrooms all en suite, a fully equipped kitchen and a large living room. His poor, fried brain could cope with that part. It could just about handle the state of the art computer set up that took up most of one wall, and the cardboard boxes of cash that were stacked up in a corner. But what nearly sent him gibbering over the edge into madness was the polythene that covered absolutely everything, including being tucked neatly around the seat in the john, and what seemed to be a bedraggled Mason Eckhart talking animatedly to himself.

It didn't take him long to figure out that Eckhart really wasn't himself and, as a painful spasm overtook him, he thought that they were the sick looking after the sicker. And that seemed quite funny as he dropped to knees, laughing around the cramps.

Eckhart stopped his one way debate and leaned down. "Are you quite all right? And…" He looked about. "What are you doing here?"

Brennan looked up in smiling surprise. "I kinda thought that's what you might tell me."

"What? Oh, yes, well…" The older man continued his rather vague perusal of his surroundings. "Let me see. First thing is, we really need to get this place cleaned up, I simply cannot function in such a, a dirty environment. You didn't see any rats did you?"

"Er, no. And it's pretty sterile, I'd say." Brennan picked himself up.

"Don't come near me!" Eckhart shrieked, leaping back a pace. 

"Okay, I won't." Brennan raised his hands showing he was no threat. "Tell you what, I'll thank you for your hospitality, and just leave, okay? This is obviously a bad time for you."

"Yes, yes do that, thank you. No! No, you have to stay, I have something, there's something we have to do."

"Nothing like knowing what you want," Brennan said, wondering when the Alice would turn up with the White Rabbit in tow.

"You, you're, er… Mutant X." He waved towards the computer. "Find them. I need to go lie down." 

Since then, Brennan had discovered that Eckhart wasn't in his right mind very often, but when he was he made a warped kind of sense. He was trying to resurrect Mutant X to fight his battles so that he could have a place in the world to call home. Very sad, but very true, and although there were probably better things that either of them could be doing with their time, Brennan was more than happy to help Eckhart find the surviving members of the team, even if for different reasons. Because while Eckhart wanted a strike force, Brennan wanted his family back.

There was one small fly in the ointment. In one of his more lucid moments, Eckhart had been able to trip the SGFlex. The design had become more refined so that it no longer needed a special gun to apply or deactivate. Unfortunately, Brennan's experience in the pod seemed to have done something to him, and the instant the SGFlex was disabled he was screaming in pain as his electrical bolts fired off uncontrollably. How Eckhart had gotten away with just a mild shock was anyone's guess. Perhaps all that rubber and polythene. 

Without the technology of the pod to regulate the flow, he eventually burned out and when he came to, Eckhart had re-activated the SGFlex. Between them, they found a setting where Brennan had some control, but felt as though he was right back where he started when his powers first developed, when they were just about strong enough to hot wire a car if he pushed it to the max.

Trying now to forget about his problems, Brennan concentrated on his friends. Adam was the most prominent, but Eckhart was quite insistent that the girls had to be retrieved before dealing with him, and if half of what Eckhart was telling him between the nonsensical ramblings was true, then Brennan could find no fault in that. Unfortunately on the face of it, there was no sign of either of the girls, although Brennan didn't let that deter him for the moment, as Eckhart's hacking skills were not a patch on his own. Speaking of which, Jesse was the only other member who was visible, and Eckhart had already tried and failed there. Well, right now Brennan was more able than the older man in all departments. Mentally and physically, but also sneakily, and he was quite determined that Jesse wasn't going to say no to **him**.

*****

"Are you sure you have to leave, Chiqua?" Paulo asked mournfully.

Shalimar packed the meagre belongings Paulo had bullied out of his men for her - a change of clothes and some currency, although she left the pistol untouched. "Yeah," she said without looking up. "I've been out of it for too long." She was fit now, although the visions and nightmares were still pretty wild, and since Paulo had negotiated a transport back north for her she was itching to go.

Paulo nodded. "I have a little surprise for you?"

Shalimar shook her head. "You've done way more then enough. Especially for someone you regard as a monster."

"Ah, but that is where you're wrong." She looked up as he continued. "See, we've only met but one of the mutant threat." Shalimar pointed to herself and he nodded. "And well, you are not so bad, nice to look at, and you give good argument for why mutants are not necessarily such a bad thing. Not all of my men agree, but enough maybe."

Shalimar was a little surprised. Some of the men, those who'd wanted her shot, never stopped looking at her with distrust and hatred. The rest, including Paulo, treated her with caution and respect but never fear, although she and Paulo had spent days arguing about the mutant versus human. 

"Enough for what?" she asked.

"To come with you, of course. We have no ties here. Not until we find a good woman to settle us down. It would be good to see what all the fuss is about, to lend our arms where needed." Paulo shrugged. "I may not own you, Chiquita, but I'll not give up so easily."

She opened her mouth to object, but saw the quietly determined set to his jaw. "Thanks," she said, nodding. "That would be good."

*****


	5. Month 4

+ Month 4 

Sarcastic smile firmly in place, Proxy Blue addressed her diminishing audience. "Just to prove that we're not all dead in the water, it seems that Cyberteam have regrouped and rebuilt, climbing back from the minor league support services to be a major player once more. Word has it that the seat of power behind the White House is enlisting specialised help to bring Cyberteam down. 

"Security services are lax nationwide says the latest Harris poll, but only those who haven't been affected by the so-called Prozac Syndrome – who comes up with these stupid names? Don't answer that – have had the wherewithal to take advantage and get rich quick. Bizarrely enough, it's those same individuals who were awake enough to take the Harris survey. And they're complaining? These little snippets make good comedy, people, so lets get them coming back in, okay?"

 *****

Jesse stood in his accustomed place behind Victoria's chair as the meeting took place. William Morrisen was there, as was Raymond, and he was somewhat disconcerted that they were all talking about him.

"I'm sure Raymond could de-condition the boy in a few days," Victoria was saying to Senator Morrisen, and Raymond nodded his agreement.

"It's just a combination of drugs, mental manipulation and physical persuasion," he elaborated, and Jesse shivered in remembrance of the last, with which he'd had far too recent an encounter.

"Mental manipulation, hm?" Senator Morrisen let the words roll slowly off his tongue. "Wouldn't be hiding any psionics out here would you, Vicky dearest?"

Jesse felt Victoria shudder at the deliberate use of that hated nickname. "You know perfectly well, darling, that my thing is for moleculars, so you can stop prodding. Now do you want my boy or not?"

Morrisen hemmed and hawed a while before finally saying, "If the price is reasonable, then yes, I'll buy him. But I rather like him the way he is. Far less trouble and a lot more productive if we can unlock just that one part of his mind."

"Oh, I'm not selling him, William, he's far too valuable. I am prepared to hire him out by the day, however. So long as he comes back undamaged."

"By the week, as this could take some time. I can guarantee he'll be physically undamaged, I really wouldn't want to allow that at all." Morrisen looked at Jesse critically, but with an underlying eagerness that he couldn't readily identify, yet sent shivers up and down his spine. "Mentally, I can't be so sure. There's a telepath in custody and I thought I'd have her mess around and see what she could do. If it goes wrong, you wouldn't know the difference, would you? And won't you be wanting him back for social functions?"

Victoria laughed, and Jesse was trying very hard to process what was happening. It sounded like Victoria was going to send him away, but that couldn't be right so he must have misunderstood. "No, William, I can have Dale stand in for a few weeks, and I'm quite happy to take the risk with your telepath. I'm just a little concerned that with your predilection for pretty and reluctant young men that you might, well, you know. I've always found it quite ironic that your penchant for an all-female staff has the media labelling you as a womaniser."

Senator Morrisen looked positively offended. "Victoria! Consent may be a grey area, but the key word there is 'pretty'. They wouldn't be pretty anymore if I damaged them now would they? My guarantee is valid."

"Very well, we have a deal." Victoria smiled, and Jesse felt as though the bottom had fallen out of his world.

*****

The new Kinetic was a lot stronger than the old and the Psionic Circle's strength leaped up, increasing as the other six compensated and balanced.

"We are upgraded enough" This from Cyber. "Wipe the user's hard drive."

"We still need an operator," Path objected. "What about his number two?"

"Viable," confirmed Cyber, and the others started to agree.

"No!"

"Em?" Path asked.

"He's a traitor, wants to destroy our kind, betrayed me and deserves only contempt," Emma explained heatedly.

"So does Morrisen," pointed out Projector, "yet we're here."

"We could persuade him a partnership is in both our interests," returned Path. "Em?" 

Emma felt the pressure from the others, knew that she could veto the idea and they wouldn't complain. Theirs was a partnership of persecuted and abused histories, no pressure ever came to bear from inside their group. They were merely asking her. And they were right. Adam was a perfect choice. She could take her revenge another day.

"Agreed," she sighed and spun away to find something more enjoyable to play with. And she did find something just coming into range. Someone she didn't believe it could be, and didn't want to bring attention to, so she sent out a hint. A hint that might mean something to someone.

*****

Brennan tied his visit to Langley's estate with a house party that Senator Langley was hosting, which made it easy to sneak in with the caterers' coming and goings from their van with piles of oven trays and plates.

Keeping to the shadows and least used hallways, something that for such a tall, rangy young man he did surprisingly well, Brennan peered into rooms where people were mingling until he spotted Jesse, dressed in a smart tuxedo and hanging off Senator Langley's arm. 

Eventually, Langley whispered something to Jesse, who smiled and nodded and headed towards the little boy's room, where Brennan accosted him.

"Jess, listen to me," Brennan began, very aware of Eckhart's claim that Jesse was somewhat vacant, though the younger man seemed perfectly fine to him. "We have to get you out of here."

With a quick flick of his wrist, Jesse untied his bow tie and undid his top button, leaning against the doorframe to the stall. He wrapped the thick black ribbon around his hand as he frowned. "So tell me," he said, flashing blue eyes looking Brennan up and down with obvious contempt. "Why should I take any notice, let alone go anywhere with, well, what other description is there, but white trash?"

Brennan's temper flared. "Listen rich bitch, some of us have had our guts ripped to shreds while you've been swanking around up here in your ivory tower. You're coming with me whether you like it or not!"

"Ya think?" Jesse scoffed. "You and whose army?"

Pursing his lips and without thinking, Brennan punched Jesse in the face and couldn't help but feel satisfied as the shorter man fell to the floor, stunned. Jesse didn't usually have a glass jaw, but there was always a first time. 

But as Brennan went to pick Jesse up, he was surprised to see the younger man's features shifting and changing. No time to worry about it now, he needed to get them both back to the apartment.

*****

If Paulo and the three men that came with him didn't believe that Shalimar was a feral before, they certainly did now.

She couldn't explain how she knew where to head, could only tell them which area, a city, they needed to be in. Once there, Shalimar seemed lost for a while, her eyes flashing gold every now and then as she tested the air around her. And for the moment, Paulo followed her blindly. 

They'd wandered for a few days, and Paulo was beginning to think that Shalimar was hunting for something that was no longer there. Until she picked up a scent.

"Brennan!" she smiled, and was off, the four men - all very fit - having to push themselves to keep up with her. They nearly ran into her as she skidded to a stop, peering around a corner. "Stay here," she told them, before sauntering out.

Brennan was just getting out of an old battered car. 

"Hey, big guy," she called with a cheeky half-smile, "wanna go for a ride."

Looking irritated, Brennan turned around, but words died on his lips as he saw her. "Shal!" he managed eventually, opening his arms to her. "Where the fuck have you been, I've been going crazy! And what's with the fashion statement?"

Shalimar scuffed the ground awkwardly, not ready yet to submit to any kind of embrace from anyone. "Been around," she said, tugging at her too big pants. "And well, I like to think of it as fashion forward, you know?"

Brennan lowered his arms, frowning. "You okay, Shal?"

"Sure," she said brightly, "just…" She shrugged, "been through stuff. Got a pad we can share for few nights? We've been sleeping rough a while and could use some cleaning up." 

"Of course." Brennan didn't hesitate, then rewound slightly. "We? How many?"

When the four men came out, Brennan recognised the tallest immediately as a rival for Shalimar's affections, and concluded that this Paulo person was the reason that the feral wasn't her normal touchy feely self. Then again, she was hardly affectionate with the other man either, but maybe she was just being tactful.

Eckhart would probably object to the four, which Brennan would be more than happy about, but the older man wanted Shalimar here as much as the elemental did.

Pointing out the apartment, Brennan went round to the other side of the car to get Jesse out. Or what had been Jesse. It was now a blank faced hermaphrodite with white eyes, no lips, nose or hair and pasty grey skin. 

Brennan heard Shalimar giggle as she followed her friends up the stairs before turning to wait for Brennan. As Brennan turned back, the thing's face turned blindly towards Shalimar, then shivered, trembling hard as brown turning to blonde hair grew from its scalp, eyes swirled multi-coloured settling to brown, skin slowly darkened to sun-kissed, and lips grew fuller.  And as its nose grew, so its bust and muscles toned. 

"I'm called Dale," she/it smiled, "And if she doesn't want you, I can be her for you."

*****


	6. Month 5

+ Month 5 

When Proxy Blue had an angry face on, she looked positively vampiric. "Since my mailboxes are screaming wastelands of desolation, here's what I think. There are billions of human beings out there, and there are still a few hundred mutants out there. And you know what? You're all exactly the same. All sitting on your asses waiting for someone else to do your dirty work. Most of you don't even know that there's dirty work to be done. If you want to live in a world where anyone can be arrested at anytime for being the wrong size, shape, colour, sex, race, religion or genetic ancestry, then go ahead, stay exactly where you are. But I'm telling you, one day, it'll be you that's looked sideways at by the wrong person, or chosen to paint your front door the wrong colour. You think I'm kidding? Remember when painting your front door red got rotten eggs thrown at it? Think about it. There **are** people out there willing to fight for you, but you need to get off your asses and help them. Mail me, I'm lonely."

*****

Jesse's head was a complete mess, but at least now he could hide inside a computer to try and sort it all out. He was swamped by events and feelings and memories and all sorts that were tossing him about in a chaotic storm that threatened to drown him at any second.

Morrisen made his skin crawl and even now the trip to this place made him feel sick. Maybe it was a small thing, but to Jesse the mere idea twisted his gut. The older man had put his hand on his leg and run it up…

Jesse had phased right then, involuntarily, and grateful that he had the power to do so. He almost forgot sometimes that he could do that, as Victoria only let him do it as a party trick. Morrisen had cursed and when they'd arrived, the first thing that the man had done was turn his SGFlex to full lock. 

The next thing he'd done was put him in what seemed to be a tiny depersonalised bedroom. There he'd got intimate with the girl who lived there, but not in a way he'd ever have dreamed. They'd not spoken a word as she'd put her hands at his temples, leaned her forehead into his and gently delved into his mind. This had been the first time that it occurred to Jesse that there might be something wrong in his own head. 

The symbolic picture she used to do what she'd been asked to was a large silver ball with a grid painted on its surface. Like a scuba diver she visited each square, swimming between them looking for the one she wanted, and as Jesse looked closer he could see that each square was a door with a padlock.

She even opened one or two, had a quick look inside and shut them again. One gave him the all too fleeting feeling of warmth, and another of pain, and he wondered what they might have been. Eventually she found the one she wanted and he looked over her shoulder to see inside. There were cables and green boards, black chips and blue flashes and she smiled benevolently, swam back and **tugged**. The cables had snaked out, grabbed and pulled him at breakneck speed back to reality. 

And he **remembered**. It wasn't a huge amount, but it was enough to kick off. It was learned knowledge, picked up he didn't know when or how, but a knowledge that had been locked away from him for far too long. And when he woke back up into reality he was in a new room, one with a bed and a computer. A really, really smart computer, complete with VR access.

It really was only the learned knowledge he had that he remembered. And that huge silver ball that way too many people had been messing with. Just the thought of anyone playing in his head ever again gave him the shakes, and he didn't even really know why other than it was a violation that too many people had perpetrated. 

It didn't take long before he felt up to diving in to the computer, and he was elated when things he'd forgotten fell back into place and he started surfing like he'd never left.

Shortly after that, he'd received his instruction. To take over Cyberteam. That was a name he was sure he should remember from somewhere, but if there was a memory there then it was firmly locked away. 

During his surfing, however, he found three people inside the computer that intrigued him. 

The first was Proxy Blue. He found her web page while surfing for information on Cyberteam. She had a lot to say, and although at first it meant nothing to him, he kept revisiting because some of her words were tugging at something inside him. After a few red herrings and detours he found that Proxy Blue and Cyberteam shared some commonalities which bore exploring, and there he found the second individual of interest.

There was a Central Control to Cyberteam, and whoever was running it was very smart. This was going to be a challenge and, for the first time since he could remember, his blood sang in anticipation. But there was an odd familiarity to the set up, and what further confused him were files authored in his name.

The third person was in his dreams, he thought. Or at least his daydreams when sat in front of the computer. She led him down electronic pathways, took him flying through cyberspace and exploring hard drives. She gave him an escape and he fell in love. Not with her, but her world. She was always there when he started surfing, green haired, red eyed and wild, and her name was Cyber.

But the real world was grey, mundane and terrifying with his lack of understanding or identity. And then finally there was Victoria. She'd given him to Morrisen, told him to treat the Senator as if he were her, but to remember that she would take him back and that was a promise. And that was the only lifeline Jesse had to hold on to.

*****

Shalimar eyed Brennan at the computer, momentarily uncertain as to whether she was looking at Brennan or Dale, the latter being mischievous and constantly shifting form from one person to another. S/he seemed to have no identity to call hir own, so s/he borrowed others. 

But s/he couldn't hide hir scent and that told Shalimar that the person before her was Brennan. "Anything interesting?" she asked, coming to stand behind him.

"No, still nothing on Emma or Jesse. You ready to go?"

"Yep, the guys are just getting together."

Brennan turned towards the console, and Shalimar could virtually feel the jealousy rolling off him. "I suppose Paulo's going with you." 

"Yes, he is," she said and paused. "There isn't anything between us you know. He's never touched me like that, and I've never touched him." And it would be none of your business if I did, she thought, but I hate this tension between us.

"You don't touch," *me* "anyone anymore," Brennan remarked stiffly, and Shalimar froze.

It was true, but she couldn't bring herself to face that just yet. "Right," she said, withdrawing. "So stop taking it so personally." Slipping on her jacket, she winced as she realised it was one on loan from Paulo, and with the way Brennan was looking at her he would have realised that too. "So," she began brightly, pretending nothing had happened. "Do you think Charlotte will be a problem?"

"Where she is?" Brennan visibly relaxed as conversation turned to business. "I doubt it."

*****

"We must terminate Morrisen now," Cyber demanded, and the rest of the group recoiled.

"Em asked you to watch over Jesse, Cyber," Path tried to calm her down. "But aren't you being a little over-protective?"

"No." Cyber was emphatic. "Em instructed that Jesse not be damaged. Morrisen conflicts with that instruction. We have agreed this before. Morrisen must be terminated."

"What does Morrisen do, Cyber?" Emma asked.

"Access to that information is denied." Cyber said, and it was clear that no more would come from her apart from a white-hot anger.

"Her reasons don't matter," Kin said flatly. "Cyber is right. Morrisen controls us, he is a threat that must be eliminated and we can do it right now. Kane we can control, make him work for us. Kane wants to destroy us, destroy all mutants, but we can give him reason not to."

"Kane is viable," Cog interjected softly. "Morrisen's futures are all detrimental to us should we continue to be allied."

"For what purpose?" asked Illusion. "What will we do with our freedom?"

"Play!" said Cyber excitedly, and the other six giggled. Though they didn't know her age, Cyber was definitely very young.

"We must have purpose," said Kin. "If Morrisen dies we lose purpose."

"We free the people and help stabilise," said Emma, and a chorus of agreement rose from the others.

"Play, too?" Cyber asked hopefully.

"Play too!" the others agreed. Then there was silence as they concentrated. 

They sought out Morrisen and used the link they had with him. Path told him he was dead while Em took away his hope and Kin squeezed his heart while Projector filled his mind with the realities of the death and destruction he'd wrought. 

When he was found the next day, it was deemed an unfortunate heart attack.

Adam Kane, however, was not so pliable. When Path tried to get inside his head, he threw her right back out. Emma recognised her own techniques and cursed herself for working with him in her previous life to build up shields.

*****

"Oh. Are you still here?" Eckhart appeared in the living room. "And hasn't that wretched maid been in yet?"

"Yes, she's been in, and the place is spotless," Brennan told him. "We're just leaving."

Dale had chosen to get up as an incredibly ditzy Shalimar this morning, which Brennan took some exception to. "Can't you be someone else?" he complained.

"Like who?" she asked and hir voice deepened, shape changed, hair shortened and darkened slightly and eyes lightened to blue. "Your bestest buddy?" he asked from Jesse's mouth. "Or I know, how about this?" His shape changed again, hair growing longer, redder, eyes widened and mouth narrowed. "You like her too, don't you?" Emma's voice asked.

"Just, stop it!" Brennan snapped, lengthening his stride away from the apartment. "Do what the hell you like. You're of no help anyway!"  Dale's loyalties seemed to switch as often as hir appearance, and although s/he'd claimed no knowledge of where Jesse had gone, s/he'd volunteered to hang around and help. Brennan didn't trust hir as far as he could throw hir.

Switching back to Shalimar, she skipped to catch up. "So, why do you check this place out every day, anyway?" she asked as they headed downtown.

Brennan sighed and wished she'd go away, because a ditzy Shalimar who'd misplaced her braincell had to be one of the most irritating beings on the planet. "Because if Jesse ever shows up, that's where he'd leave a message for me," he said. "For all I know he could be dead, but I'm not giving up hope on either him or Emma."

Dale flipped to Emma than back to Shalimar. "No, they're not dead," she said.

Brennan looked at her, the penny dropping with a loud clang. "You can only mimic people you've seen, right? So when or where did you see Emma?"

Dale blinked. "Might've seen a picture or something," she shrugged. 

"You – whoa!" As they rounded the corner to the burnt out derelict that used to house the Cyberteam Central Control, Brennan spotted a forty-something non-descript woman climbing in through a blackened window.

Deciding that anyone official would have just ducked in the police-taped front door, Brennan's curiosity was piqued. The woman did not exactly look like the type to be either squatting or looting.

Leaving Dale with strict instructions not to move, Brennan crept into the building, carefully following the woman through the blackened rooms. A clunk and a squeak behind and Brennan looked to see that Dale had disobeyed him and fallen in through the window. He found it bizarrely off-putting that a Shalimar clone should be so far from the fierce, agile woman he knew.

An unsubtle clearing of the throat and the woman he'd been following was standing in a broken doorway with a gun pointed at them.

"Ooh, Fibbie!" laughed Dale, and switched to Charlotte Cooke. 

The woman blinked. "Ms Cooke?"

"No, she's not. Who are you and what are you doing in my friend's apartment?"

"Your friend?" The woman considered a moment and then put her gun away. "You must be Brennan Mulwray."

"Fibbie?" Brennan pushed, echoing Dale.

"*Ex*-FBI. Although I seem to have forgotten to actually turn my badge in. Lena McEnery."

"And you would be here because?"

Lena sighed. "It doesn't matter. It's all ruined. I was hoping to find some Cyberteam evidence that I could have used."

"What, to destroy them?"

"No, to help them." Lena snapped. "I'm sorry, bad day. Now if you'll excuse me I'll be on my way." 

*****

When Adam felt the tickling that told him there was a psionic about, he congratulated himself on his ingenuity. He'd been practising some of the meditation techniques he'd been through with Emma before they'd left Sanctuary, but had also done some very fruitful, and very worrying, research.

Recognising that some people, including himself,  were immune to whatever was producing the general lethargy, he'd done some tests and compared the results. And there was a natural immunity there. Well, except for himself and two others; they had no natural immunity, yet were immune anyway. The other two, however, had been in contact with moleculars. A specific type of molecular. One had voluntarily and regularly consumed an aphrodisiac produced naturally by a mutant, while the other had been spat on with acid saliva by another.

Which planted a large healthy seed of paranoia into his brain. 

He was at least superficially immune to the psionics, although he wouldn't want to test it out against any great force. But why? When had he touched a secreting molecular recently enough that he'd kept the inherent immunity?

When the call came about Morrisen, Adam knew who had been responsible and went to the basement levels to find the Psionic Circle.

He could feel Emma's emotions. They needed him.

And, when he thought it through, he needed them. He didn't care what happened to the people; they could do as they pleased, but he could use them to control those he didn't have time to play political games with, use them to find and bring in the mutants that were still out there causing havoc.

An agreement was reached.

Smiling, Adam left that place and thought about the other resources suddenly at his disposal. The techno-geek chained to his computer for a start. And if he moved fast, then - as Morrisen had done before him - Adam could take over the spoils of war, including Genomex and LexMor.

*****

Lena was lost in her world of technology. She and Nora worked side by side now, because they were fighting a war. 

Battles were fought and lost in nanoseconds, stealth invasions completed faster than light, the intruder with octopus tentacles striking at her systems with unerring accuracy and deadly precision.

They fought each and every encounter with everything they had and, between them, they held their assailant at bay. But it was a close call and the enemy never seemed to sleep. Eventually it would wear them down, but they would both die fighting if they had to.

*****


	7. Month 6

+ Month 6 

Proxy Blue was positively cheerful in a pixilated kind of way. "Finally, the world awakens! My mailboxes are crammed with stories of drugged water and food, and the strange person living in the haunted house that you're sure must be the mutant responsible for sedating you all. Well, I'm sorry to throw all your fantasies out the window, but before looking at your own doorstep, look at those on high. 

"Someone, somewhere pulled the plug on something, and I for one am grateful that they did. But remember people, both humans and mutants were affected. Exceptions to the rule fell in both human and mutant populaces. So how can one of you blame the other? Consider how the politics has changed over the last eighteen months, and maybe you'll see some conspiracies other than the mutant or human ones the media would have you believe.

"On another note, Senator Morrisen's untimely death last month seems to have had little impact on the political infrastructure behind the White House, with the other members, senators and uh, business men taking up the slack. Interestingly enough, Morrisen's replacement as senator, a naïve young man in his fifties, took over Morrisen's seat yesterday on a pro-mutant stand. Quite the reversal.

"Oh, and here's a thought. Timing. How far does coincidence stretch? Keep 'em coming kids, I'm drowning and I love it!"

*****

"This is absolutely ridiculous," Mason Eckhart muttered to Brennan. "I really don't see why it's necessary for me to be here."

"Well, it was your idea," Brennan hissed back at him.

"And if you'd seen fit to inform me that your little doppelganger could impersonate Senator Langley, I would not have included myself in my plan, now would I?"

"But you already knew that Dale could impersonate anyone s/he's seen."

"Well I **might** have known, but **you** know full well that I've been somewhat under the weather recently."

Brennan sighed and decided that he wasn't going to win this. Since the Prozac Syndrome had passed Eckhart's episodes of confusion were growing less, almost in direct correlation with the slow decaying of his skin. But with a Michael Jackson surgical mask and Panama hat, he could get away with being an 'eccentric' in these halls of power.

After some persuasion, Dale had revealed that s/he knew where Emma was, as well as who she was, and although Brennan had the gut feeling that there was much the shifter wasn't telling them, they decided to go for a rescue attempt.

They'd arrived with the idea that they would sneak in but, ever helpful, Dale had taken the lead without giving notice. switching to the big burly security chief to get them inside and then to Langley to tour the halls.  With Brennan zapping secured locks and cameras, they quickly found their way down to the lower levels.

Path pulled Emma from her concentrated focus to see the small group who had broken into their home, explaining that she saw a picture of Emma in their minds, especially the elemental's.

Emma felt a surge of happiness that Brennan had come to her, but as the group explored the three they quickly realised what the intruders intended to do.

"We have to get them out of here." Emma was abruptly deluged by the fear that consumed them all, herself included. "They mustn't take us away!"

Just the mere idea of being away from the machine was so horrific to each of them that they turned terrified thoughts inwards. Emma had to pull back. "No! We mustn't kill them, just stop them! Why didn't Dale tell us?" 

"Push them out," agreed Path. "Dale is a free spirit, not controlled by me. I only offered hir a deal. Perhaps s/he saw no threat?"

"Perhaps," agreed Cog, "but nevertheless, they **are** a threat."

And the Psionic Circle pushed them away, focussing on propelling them out of the basement, then out of the building. They only relaxed when the three abandoned all thought of entering the place again, and disappeared into the city.

*****

With Charlotte Cooke having been taken off-continent, it had taken Shalimar and her group a couple of weeks via the black market to get to the camp where she was apparently being held.

It was a work-camp mining industrial diamonds and the security was pretty lax, mostly because there was nowhere to run to. With desert for miles around, the only options were to stay in the camp or die in the unforgiving sands. 

At least, that's how it appeared from the vantage point on top of the dune that Shalimar and Paulo looked down from. With the central block being guarded and clearly where the bulk of the mutants were kept, Shalimar felt ill, absently brushing away the blood she could feel on her skin again,. 

She caught herself at Paulo's quiet cough, saw the look in his eyes and shivered. That hadn't happened for a while now and she wondered if she'd always feel it. Wondered if a mere touch would always send her back to that bloody hole she'd lived in.

But for now she had a job to do. Get one person out of there and back home where she could do most good by reversing what she'd done to Adam. Without the luxury of a lab to make up an antidote, Eckhart's half-wild plan seemed to make the most sense and Shalimar only hoped the Charlotte was in there, rescue-able and willing to help. She qualified herself with a wry smile. If the first two were achievable, then she would take great pleasure in ensuring the latter happened.

As they watched the camp, something odd seemed to be happening that they couldn't place. They couldn't see much detail; even Shalimar with her exceptional eyesight couldn't make out more than the odd gesture, but it seemed that one or two of the prisoners were very pally with their guards. Or maybe that shouldn't be such a surprise. A supply truck came and left near midday, but that was the only traffic there.

Still, they made their way to the camp under the dark of night, no moon to give them away. No one stopped them as they climbed quietly over the fence and into the compound; in fact, there was no one around at all.

The central building loomed. Shalimar couldn't bring herself to look inside so Paulo did, peering through a gap in the wall. And laughed.

"Do not be frightened, Chiquita, things are not as they seem," he said, motioning for her to look.

Heart battering at her rib cage, she swallowed hard and peeped in. The relief was immeasurable and she sagged back, Paulo catching her briefly before letting her go to lean against the wall. And as the shock overwhelmed her, she started giggling.

This wasn't a work-camp, it was a summer camp. The soldiers and the inmates were inside and getting along just fine. They were having a party, in fact, the supplies having included copious amounts of cheap vodka.

The door suddenly flung open. "Come on in, boys and girl," someone called, "we know you're out there!" 

Shalimar, Paulo and one of his men stepped out while the other two remained hidden.

"And the other two!"

Guns were trained on them, and they all stood in silence before someone pushed through, a big bear of a man. "Shalimar Fox!" he said and raised his hand to the others on his side. "She has to be a friend, she helped set up the Freedom Fighters."

The camp's occupants lowered their weapons and went back to partying, ignoring the newcomers.

"Jeff?" asked Shalimar, taking a moment to place him, he was so far out of context. "You went with Emma! Do you know where she is?"

Jeff looked at her sadly. "We were captured. Julie and Emma were taken away. I was told that Emma was executed and, and…" Here the big man's face lost all life and hope. "They said that Julie tried to escape, tried to get to me…" He couldn't finish, but didn't need to.

Giving him a moment, Shalimar then asked, "What are you doing here? What's going on? We came here expecting to rescue, uh, someone, but it looks like you got it all under control."

Jeff shook his head. "We were lucky, overpowered the guards, but you know, where was there to go? There's the supply truck, is all. There's no one here who wants to fight any more. We talked with the soldiers and decided to sit the war out." Jeff shrugged. "We don't know who we're fighting anymore, what's wrong, what's right, and our loved ones are either dead or wish **we** were."

"It's always worth fighting for your rights," Shalimar told him. "Always. And don't you want to find out what happened to Julie? Maybe she did die, or maybe they were messing with your mind. I'm not going to stop looking for Emma or the others until I see undeniable proof with my own eyes." 

"You think maybe Julie's still alive?" A brief glimmer of hope in his eyes made Shalimar wince.

"Quite honestly? I don't know. But if someone thought that telling you that would break you, why not?"

And hope flared bright.

"So," continued Shalimar, "I don't suppose one of these party people would by any remote chance be a mutant by the name of Charlotte Cooke? We'd kinda quite like to take her home with us."

Jeff grinned. "Funny you should mention her. She would do almost anything to get out of here. Give me ten minutes and we'll be ready to go."

"We?" Shalimar raised her eyebrow.

Jeff's grin broadened and he suddenly looked ten years younger. "Charlotte's a little fragile, needs a big strong man to take care of her."

Paulo's eyebrows also rose, but he had the common sense to stay quiet.

*****

Jesse didn't really care much for the outside world as it only brought pain, uncertainty and humiliation. He knew there'd been a change of things, because Adam came in to see him periodically instead of Morrisen, but the rules remained much the same.

Adam looked vaguely familiar but, being unable to place him, Jesse didn't worry about it, especially when Cyber told him he was okay.  But also, the man himself didn't bother him like Morrisen had, just came in for a report once in a while and that was all.

In cyberspace, however, things were a lot different. Cyber helped him with whatever he was doing, but she was more like an imp playing a game than someone out to actively assist him. Still, she was fun, and speeded up his manoeuvres.

And he was almost there.

It was like a game of chess, and that was something he was very good at. But so was his opponent.

He could see his victory in just a couple of moves, but he could also see that the other could also block and win too, which he had to prevent.

Distraction.

He threw in a diversion, but was distracted himself. Proxy Blue continued to fascinate him. She talked about a world that was so far outside his own it made for compelling listening.  He could verify a lot of her words by surfing other sites, and found himself missing things, few of which he could relate to.

One such thing, and perhaps the biggest he could identify, was the yearning for human company. Proxy talked at him, and Cyber played with him, while Adam was just cold. Morrisen may have been a bastard, but at least he'd paid Jesse some attention which he'd both loathed and craved. He was so lonely for some genuinely caring kind of contact it actually hurt.

Seeing his opponent's block stopped in its tracks, Jesse went for the killing blow, but couldn't quite bring himself to do it.

Proxy had her own servers that were only loosely tied in with Cyberteam's, like they were allies but not the same thing. 

He couldn't make a decision as such, because he wasn't allowed. But he could take his orders to the letter. He'd been ordered to acquire Cyberteam, not Proxy Blue. Never even mentioned her in his reports as it hadn't been relevant until now, and no one had asked. He would have told them if they'd asked.

So following the decision he hadn't made, he cut Proxy Blue loose before unleashing the killing blow on the Cyberteam Central Control.

Within seconds, the all-clear codes had been over-written and released with a new Central Control. And when he saw the acknowledgements from the other members, it felt so right he almost smiled a genuine smile.

*****


	8. Month 7

+ Month 7 

Proxy Blue was face forward and static, almost as if in mourning. "With thanks to all you cub reporters out there, I have a little backlog.  The news obviously never sleeps, however this girl does. So, for now I only have one thing to say. Cyberteam has been in invaded by an outside source. Don't know who and I don't know how, but sources tell me the foreign body's gone straight to the core. Hear me, techno-dweebs? Like a famous Fox, not of the feral kind, once said a few times; Trust No One. Not even me."

*****

Lena unplugged her palmtop from the motel room phone jack and, composing herself, left for her car, quickly driving away from the place.

She and Nora had been so completely locked out of Cyberteam that the invading force had to have been an inside job. But the only person inside who had enough information was herself. And Nora. But she could vouch for both of them. 

Since Proxy was so clinically separated, it was clearly Cyberteam the opposition had wanted, and she'd left a distraught Nora with her now useless machines to run, before someone came looking for her. She'd told Nora to run too, and the girl had grinned and gone with an assurance that said she had a back up plan to keep her safe.

There were psionic cyberpaths and Lena wondered if one of them had been responsible, but the whole structure of Cyberteam was compartmentalised; a foreign source could certainly take down one part, but not the whole thing, not that smoothly. As Sherlock Holmes said, once you've eliminated the obvious, whatever's left must be the truth. 

The original creator of Cyberteam. Who would maybe, possibly, have wanted control of his creation back. But surely he'd have asked Nora for control? Unless he thought the Cyberteam was compromised. Unless he himself was compromised. The latter being much more likely since Cyberteam's original Central Control had been taken down months ago, the Kilmartin boy paraded out by Langley at every possible occasion.  Except that he'd been noticeably absent the last few weeks. The rumour mill had it that the boy had some strange mutant illness or something equally as manufactured.

In a similar vein she went back to the original Cyberteam Central. She hadn't back there since she'd been scavenging and run into Mulwray, but this time she was hoping to run into him. Mulwray would be able to tell her if Kilmartin was back in play. Mulwray might even have a corner with a secure phone jack where she might set up Proxy.  And, just maybe, without having to run Cyberteam as well, she could concentrate on finding exactly what had happened to Darius.

*****

"We have got to take that meddling woman out of commission!" Adam ranted as he stood behind Jesse's chair. "I want you to find and destroy her."

Jesse said nothing. It was usually better that way. 

"And keep Cyberteam running. I don't want anything to confirm what she's said, so we'll keep it going for a while until any panic is forgotten."

For a moment Jesse still didn't say anything. Adam liked an acknowledgement when he was done, so when Jesse was certain that Adam had finished he said, "Yes, sir."

Normally then the door opened, shut and locked, but this time it didn't. "Are you getting fed?" the older man said.

"Yes Sir." Jesse was puzzled. Every time he came out of his cyber world there was a fresh tray of food waiting for him.

"All righty." Then Adam went and Cyber was waiting for him. Cyberteam was virtually running itself, and he had no intention of tracking Proxy down and even less intention of worrying about the repercussions of not telling Adam that. He wanted to go have fun and feel what it was like to **live**.

*****

"Well, so this is it." Eckhart gestured contemptuously at the people grouped in the polythene-clad room. "One elemental who keeps short-circuiting…"

"And I love you too," Brennan muttered under his breath.

"One specimen that doesn't know who or what it is…" Eckhart waved at the Shalimar that was purring on the seat besides Brennan, "and one that has groupies attached to her rear-end." He waved at the Shalimar that scowled from the doorway, Paolo at her side and the others arguing in the kitchen over cookie dough.

Eckhart glared at the corner. "And some random woman sitting in the corner typing an essay. Who are you, and what exactly are you doing in my living room?"

Lena looked up, startled. "Erm…"

"I brought her here," Brennan said. "She's doing some computer work for us."

Eckhart sighed. "Private militia, freaks and now techno geeks. My life is complete. But I suppose she helps with the numbers. Here, I thought you might like these." He threw something onto the table. 

Brennan opened it cautiously and everyone stared at what was revealed, resting inside the battered container. "You went to Sanctuary?" he asked.

"Well, obviously," Eckhart snapped, but didn't elaborate.

"Ooh, can I have one?" Dale asked, sliding over to the table as s/he changed into Sean Bean's Boromir and reached to take one of the silver rings.

Shalimar moved almost faster than light to grab Dale's wrist. "Not on your life," she hissed. She snapped the box closed and gave it back to Eckhart. "We're still missing three," she said simply.

*****


	9. Month 8

+ Month 8 

Proxy Blue was back to her animated self, sneering out from the TV screen. "You know what, people, this girl is so impressed. The aftermath of the Prozac Syndrome was a little rocky, but with few exceptions it's good to see you all getting it together. I hear somewhere out west the local humans went and freed the mutants from a quarry, and now they're all working together to make it a proper working plant again. The soldiers guarding the place apparently had orders not to resist any activities of this kind. This is not the only place this is happening, and I've gotta wonder if this is a co-ordinated effort, or just coincidence?

"Those at the top seem completely unaware of what's happening out on the street and it's this reporter's opinion that there's something going on up there that we all need to be keeping our eyes on. I love all this good news, kids, but I need the juicy stuff!"

*****

Shalimar couldn't help looking sideways at Dale in the passenger seat. They were parked up the road from the old members' club where Lena had told them the Inner Circle was based, waiting for Adam to show up. While she didn't fully trust Lena, or Dale, or Eckhart, in these times she had no choice but to take them at their word and cover her back as much as possible.

Dale, however, was doing a damned fine impression of Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills Cop and Shalimar found it creepy the way s/he kept imitating the feral's own body every time Brennan was around. And Brennan wasn't objecting.

It was no skin off Shalimar's nose if Dale and Brennan got it together, and with Dale switching genders it would be an interesting sex life, but she really got severely creeped out by the idea that it was copy of her body being used. That's if something were happening. Which it might not be.

Dale's gaze grew intense as s/he squinted out front. "Adam's here," s/he said, excitedly

Shalimar followed hir gaze, and watched Adam paying off a cab driver before walking into the building. She hit a number on her mobile. "He's in."

Lena had hacked into the building systems and would set off some internal distractions while they used the ID's she'd set up to get some of them through security - they didn't dare assume that the Langley trick would work more than once. During the preliminary reconnaissance, she'd also found links that strongly suggested that the Cyberteam interloper was working from inside. 

Charlotte had been pretty subdued, helping Lena and letting Paulo coddle her, something which Shalimar felt a small pang of jealousy over. Now, Paulo came by the car and swapped places with Shalimar who walked over to a café bar and met Brennan there. The two put the earpieces to their mobile phones in, dialling into a conference call so they could all stay in touch. Without the sophisticated equipment of Sanctuary or Genomex, it was the best alternative they could come up with.

While Dale, Paulo and the boys took Eckhart in the front door to find Adam, Brennan and Shalimar did a little B&E round the back, intending to try and break the Psionic Circle apart. The security system was average, and certainly not built to resist an elemental with a talent for being sneaky or a feral with perfect balance. 

There were alarms going off inside but they were elevator alarms, as it seemed that they'd all become stuck at once. Shalimar's idea and Lena's work. The panic from any claustrophobes would help hide anything any psionics might pick up on.

Brennan led the way towards the basement, but as they reached the first of the lower levels Shalimar's eyes flashed at the familiar scent that hit her.

"Jesse's here," she stated. "I'll see you down there." She didn't give Brennan a chance to object, slipping through fire doors and disappearing down a corridor. She found the locked steel door, even found the person bringing food with the key in his pocket. Opened the door and found Jesse there, hands in VR gloves, head in VR helmet.

The Cyberteam logo flashed at the top right of the monitor, although the rest of the screen was moving too fast for her to see. And from that one symbol she had to assume that Jesse was back in control of Cyberteam. But from this locked room? Inside the inner Circle?

She could see his SGFlex, but decided against removing it for the moment, her gut instinct yelling that something was very wrong.

A sudden shift told her that Jesse was back with the real world, and she watched him carefully for clues. He looked healthy enough, if a little on the lean side, and definitely tired, and the blue eyes that sparkled with humour when she got her first glimpse of them quickly dulled and glazed over. 

He looked at her expectantly. 

"I've uh…"  She felt a bit awkward, as though he were judging her. "I've come to get you out of here."

"I'm not allowed," Jesse told her flatly.

Very, very wrong.

"Jess, it's me. We can do anything, remember?"

He blinked slowly at her. "I don't know you. And I can't leave without Victoria."

"Oh, for –" she cursed and pulled her hair in frustration. "I don't have time for this." Spinning, she kicked him in the gut and followed up with a stunning blow to the back of his neck. "You're out of practice, kiddo. Time was, you'd never have let me get away with that."

She was about to pick him up and take him outside when the Cyberteam logo still flashing caught her eye. The Command matrix was still open on the machine, so it didn't take her more than a moment to open it up for remote access. Lena grabbed it, rerouted and yelled 'Got it!" down the phone. 

And then all hell broke lose. Almost in unison, the building started to shake and Brennan screamed, long and loud. 

Brennan was in trouble and she needed to go help him, because there was no one else.  But she couldn't do that with an unconscious Jesse, and she couldn't leave him here.

She had to choose, and it tore her apart. 

Jesse was safer here than Brennan was down there. 

So that was her choice.

The Psionic Circle was dying. They'd been in panic as the sprinklers had suddenly gone off, threatening to short-circuit some of their hard wiring, but good little puppets with extinguishers had seen to them, and the overwhelming fear of those in the elevators had forced them to throw shields up that muted not only the hysteria but also every other sense they had extended.

And then Brennan with his sparks came in and fried their circuits. The only reason they weren't taking out their rage on him was because his own powers had backfired, his streams of electricity pouring out uncontrollably, destroying him, destroying them, and his mind was on such all-encompassing fire that they couldn't get in, and they were dying too, the machine was dying and taking them with it.

"We have to leave the machine!" Emma cried, even though her entire being screamed that she couldn't live without it. "We can build another!"

"No!" screamed Path. Always the voice of reason among them, her vehemence was shocking. "I've worked too hard for too long to get this kind of strength and power, I'm not giving it up now! I will not be a victim again!"

Emma even felt herself, swept along with the others' agreement, feeling suddenly bitter. She'd looked out for Brennan, always, and now he'd done this. Not only had she had Cyber watch over Jesse, but on her behalf, once they'd realised that Brennan had hir, Path'd had Dale look out for him. So they felt betrayed by both Dale and Brennan and wanted, needed to lash out at both of them.

Except the pressure was building up as the electricity bit into their hardware and they needed to get out now before their brains exploded.  But Path and Kin and the others would not move. Cyber was already shrieking in agony, her affinity with the machinery making her a direct conductor, both physically and mentally. And Emma couldn't bear her pain.

"I'm leaving," she told Path. "I'm taking Cyber; she's a child and deserves more than this, and you won't stop me."

Path and Kin, and the others to a lesser extent, threw anger and frustration and threats at her, but Emma stood her ground. "Please, let us go, can't you feel her agony?"

"We feel what you do, you know that," Path cried, "but we need your strength, both of you."

"Staying here will kill us all."

Blue fire cracked and snapped viciously around them, then Path sighed and the seven shared what amounted to a mental hug, a sharing of supportive feelings and thoughts and wishes and promises. "Take Cyber and go. We'll hold back to give you as much time as possible before the machine brings the building down."

"Path…" Emma tried to think of anything to make them all come with her, but they'd read her before she finished as they always had. 

"No, Em. We'd rather die than leave here," Path said. And then they were gone and she was sitting in the chair. And it didn't hit her until she'd left her cubicle to find Cyber that she'd never feel the five women who'd been an integral and intimate part of her for so long, again.

Brennan was being ripped apart from the inside out and was helpless to prevent it as his worst nightmare came true. His powers were being used against him by his own body. Worse than being a victim, he was becoming a victim to himself.

And he would not let that happen again. 

He could let it all burn out and hope the process didn't kill him, but he'd fought all his life for one thing or another and that was not a route he was willing to go down. So he used the fire burning along his nerve endings to take him to the core of his being, used the pain to bolster his failing determination, and wrestled for control over his own powers. 

It hurt more physically than he'd ever dreamed possible, but it was worse mentally as memories of his time in the power station assaulted him. He'd pushed that whole thing to the back of his mind, pretended it hadn't happened, but it had and now it was back and threatened to pull him back into a maelstrom of unresolved anger and feeling of entrapment and victimisation. But he needed to get to his powers, face that same maelstrom and reach right through it to find them.

God, but it **burned**, and he pushed his way through, not stopping to really look at what was there, promising himself he'd deal with them later, even though he knew it was a promise he'd never keep.  But he made progress anyway, breaking through to find the blue globe of energy that lived there, that gave him control. And he powered down, ending up exhausted and shaking on the floor.

Then Shalimar was there urging him to get up, protecting him from falling debris that would have sliced into him had she not been there to kick it away. 

He didn't know where he got the strength from, but if Shal said move, he was gonna move.

Shalimar helped the stumbling Brennan up the stairs out of the Basement as the building shook and plaster cracked around them. The going was too slow and she tried to hurry the elemental, but the big guy was hurting and shaking and so **weak** right now. 

She willed, and chivvied and supported him up to Jesse's level and left him in the stairwell while she dashed off to find Jesse. She had no idea how she was going to get them both out, but she had to try. She couldn't let either one of them join the blood and rot her mind still taunted her with.

Skidding to a halt she screamed in denial at the fallen ceiling that blocked her way. She couldn't get to Jesse, had no choice but to leave him behind now. She should have taken him to the stairwell before, and she hadn't, and now she couldn't get to him. 

Jesse lurched up from the floor, his gut and shoulder aching, and checked out his computer. He was locked out of Cyberteam, and there was no sign of Cyber. A surge of rage welled up in him. The bitch cat had taken away everything that had meant anything to him. 

Except Victoria. 

She would come for him. Except, with the building falling down, maybe she couldn't, maybe he'd have to find her. 

The door was open. He could go. Maybe he should. But he hadn't been told he could. At least, not by anyone he'd been told he should listen to. The bitch cat said he could, but she didn't count did she? It was all so confusing. 

A cracking sound and the he looked up to see the ceiling starting to fall. 

He wasn't allowed to make decisions, certainly not big ones. But Victoria surely wouldn't mind if he kept himself safe, would she?

So, tentatively, he crept out of his room, and down the corridor, away from the ceiling that chose to fall, taking half his room with it and covering him with plaster.

Coughing, he kept going, passing several people who were running in different directions in their bids to escape the building. He was moving through a dusty foggy dream world he didn't understand. And then to his enormous relief Victoria was there. With Raymond. 

But something was wrong.

Victoria lay next to the wall, blood oozing from a cut in her scalp where she'd clearly been hit by debris. Raymond was on his hands and knees over her, protecting her and begging her to wake him.

She couldn't be dead. She wasn't allowed to be.

Jesse touched her throat nervously, but Ray didn't stop him, so he grew a little more confident, smiling as he found a pulse. He wondered that Ray hadn't done that himself, but the relief that shone on the other man's face made his own pale in comparison.

Victoria mumbled and sighed but didn't wake up.

"She's letting you go," Ray told him suddenly. "I don't want you near her, and she doesn't want you anymore."

"What? But I, I –" More worlds crashing apart.

"Trust me," hissed Ray. "You'll thank me for this later," and grabbed Jesse's head, pushing forehead to forehead. "No time for finesse."

White noise, red rage and silent black, one after another then crashing together, and when Jesse came to, it was in time to see Raymond carrying the limp Victoria away. 

Adam wasn't quite sure what was happening. He didn't care for the politics, and had only popped by to run the daily maintenance on the Psionic Circle on his way to LexMor to continue his research into finding a more terminal solution to the mutant problem. But from the moment he'd entered things had been odd.

Various malfunctions meant that he hadn't gone directly down to the basement, instead opting for the members lounge to see who was there.

He found Langley and one of her minions, unsurprisingly since she spent most of her waking life here, plus a couple of others. 

"Well, well," said Mason Eckhart, coming in behind him, surrounded by flunkies. "How very nice to see you again."

"Need a little help?" Adam replied, scratching at his chin whilst looked directly at Eckhart's ravaged face.

"Oh, just a minor little set back. It'll all be dealt with once you get around to giving me back Genomex. But, look at you. Big fish in the little pond here, aren't you?"

"I see your inner bitch hasn't changed then," Adam retorted. "What can I do for you before I have you ejected."

Eckhart was about to reply, but that was when the walls thumped and started shaking.

The California-raised Langley was insistent that it was just a little tremor, despite her minion's statement that they were nowhere near San Andreas.

"Oh, I expect it's just a little molecular having a tantrum somewhere," she said airily, putting her tea down smartly as it sloshed about. "I just hope it's over before I stain something."

But it only got worse, and Adam dived past Eckhart to get to the basement.

Eckhart put his surgical mask back on and said, "I think we'll come back another day," before marching out, just in time as the front doorway collapsed. He could hear Langley screeching as Raymond tried to physically haul her to safety.

Waiting outside, they listened to Brennan and Shalimar still inside, Paulo and Dale both ready to dive in and pull their comrades out.

Emma's shields had never been so strong, nor raised so high as she blocked out the people round her. She couldn't feel the pain of her psionic sisters, they were shielding her from that, but she knew they were in agony. 

She carried the unconscious Cyber as best she could. The kid turned out to be all of around ten years old, and at that age was big enough to cause her problems, forcing her to stop and rearrange the girl at every opportunity. 

Rounding a corner she collided with Jesse. "We have to get out of here," he told her, but didn't seem to have any plan as to how to accomplish that. Neither did she, for that matter, and giggled at the thought of them both with matching scattered wits.

"This is Cyber," she said as she lost her grip again, letting the girl slip bonelessly to the floor. "Look after her for me?"

Smiling slightly, he heaved the girl over his shoulder in a fireman's left. "Okay, well, do you know how we get out of here? It's like a maze."

"Not a clue. Hug a wall and see where it takes us?"

Finding another stairwell, they climbed up, only to meet Adam on his way down.

"Emma!" Adam looked shocked. 

"The Circle's gone," she told him, "We need to get out of here."

Back to Brennan, and Shalimar pushed and pulled him out, dust getting everywhere resulting in bloodshot tearing eyes and choking lungs.

Even outside, they daren't stop; the building was crumbling, bricks dropping and windows caving. They needed to get out of the way.

Stumbling along with blurred vision, they prayed that the others had made it out, until hands caught them, and Dale and Paulo were there for them, and none of then could understand why Shalimar clung to Brennan and Paulo, refusing to look at the disintegrating building.

Emma screamed when the Circle finally gave up; even Cyber screamed without waking up as Jesse and Adam pulled them out, far away from Eckhart or his flunkies. 

The other side of the block, Dale clutched hir ears, hir scream silent and deafening. Anyone within the district with the slightest psionic bent felt their pain. 

And then it was gone, and all that was left was one block of devastation.

*****


	10. Month 9

+ Month 9 

"Well, good people, things are really shaking upstairs," Proxy Blue told her viewers. "Martial law is still in place, but the White House and Senate restructuring that's being going on since the destruction of what has commonly been dubbed the Inner Circle has ensured that all laws invoked since the beginning have been revoked. And the President today read out the Constitution across the major networks in a bid assure the people that proper democratic process was being put back in place, that mutants have the same rights as humans. 

"Nicely naïve and what the people want to hear, but I think we all know it's not going work out like that; ingrained prejudices and fear of the unknown will prevent it, but we're headed in the right direction. One at a time, and under controlled conditions, the mutant slave workers are being released from various industrial encampments, and elementals are being asked to volunteer their services to help keep generators going while repairs are made as fast as possible in order to release those still in enforced service.

"And talking of the Inner Circle fiasco, it's been confirmed that although injuries were minor, there were five mutant bodies discovered. The Mayor was quick to pledge support from both humans and mutants to the families of the deceased.

"Anyone ever wonder what Genomex and LexMor are up to these days? They used to be rival companies, both dedicated toward genetic research, but now come under the same CEO, a renowned geneticist in his own right. Could make interesting reading. Keep 'em coming kids, it's all good stuff!"

*****

All of them were quiet and introspective, each with their own problems, any bond between them seemingly shattered in the aftermath of the Inner Circle's demise. It wasn't supposed to have gone down like that, and Brennan wandered the streets as he tried to deal with his guilt. 

He'd meant for his little spark to short-circuit some hardware, never expecting it to feedback and nuke his SGFlex. 

Because of him, five women were dead, Shalimar was killing herself with guilt over Jesse and Dale just seemed lost. And Adam was holed up in Genomex, inventing ways to kill mutants.

"Hey, penny for them!" a familiar voice called from above. Brennan looked up and Kathy dropped to the ground from the fire escape. "You don't hold a grudge do you?" she asked, her smile sly.

In a flash he had her up against the wall, fighting to keep his temper in check as he came close to throttling her. "Do you have any fucking idea what you put me through? Even one tiny clue how many people have died, or suffered because of you?"

Kathy squirmed and tried to reply, but her air was almost entirely blocked. Brennan kept her there for a second, then dropped her. 

She rubbed her throat and stood shakily. "Guess I deserved that, huh?" she croaked. "I'm sorry you suffered, Brennan, we had good times. And I'm sorry about the people who lost out over the Underground. But I'm not sorry for being who I am. It's all about wealth, and we got it. Your team of thieves remember? We're going strong. Help one side, help the other, make a little money here and there. Just like we did when we helped out your techno-geek friend."

"And that's meant to make it all better?" Brennan asked bitterly. "Propagating the war? And playing both sides against the middle, I'd bet too."

Kathy shrugged. "Thought it might help."

"You. Might help you. It doesn't help me. Now just fuck off, and if I ever see you again, I **will** kill you." His temper was on a very short fuse, and in his eyes she was a traitor and a murderer.

"Hey, you might think you're a hero, but you're really still just a glorified criminal," she taunted. In another life, he might have wondered just what she was trying to accomplish. In this life, however, he had too much pressure built up inside him. "I can still have you arrested for a whole host of thievery, you know," she continued, and he stopped hearing the words as a red haze come over him and he just cut loose. 

He didn't aim especially well, but he heard her scream as she went flying back down the alley. She might've died or she might've just been stunned. He didn't care, and walked away.

*****

Shalimar's guilt had temporarily been assuaged by Eckhart and Lena's discovery that both Emma and Jesse were both alive and with Adam at Genomex. 

Paulo was spending more and more time with Charlotte, his men finding interests elsewhere, and Brennan seemed to prefer his own company, leaving her with Dale who didn't seem to know what to do with hirself.

The shape shifter couldn't seem to settle on one body to wear, constantly changing. It seemed that s/he'd been captive virtually hir whole life one way or another, constantly being told who to be, and now that s/he was free of Path's influence, s/he didn't know what to do.

Spending time with the shifter slowly brought the feral's compassionate nature back to the fore as she helped the other form the beginnings of an identity for hirself. S/he'd thought hirself female at first, and had started off borrowing Shalimar's body, with her permission this time. But they then decided that that was because s/he'd had more practice at being female. In the end, like working their way through an entire wardrobe, Dale settled on a boy in his late teens, about hir own age. Based on someone he'd seen in the street, they'd spent hours in front of the mirror as he changed his hair and eye colour, altered the shape of his nose slightly and straightened the teeth, before he was happy.

"And now you're unique two ways, which is more than most of us," Shalimar told him after they'd dressed him in some of Paulo's men's clothes.

"Two ways?" Dale asked. 

"Sure. You get your mutant side, and you also got your **own** human side. You just gotta work on being your own man." She was taken by surprise when the boy threw himself at her, enveloping her in a huge hug. 

But after hesitating, she returned it, expecting to see the blood crawling up her arms.  But it didn't, so she hugged him harder.

*****

When Eckhart was satisfied that his team had pulled themselves back together sufficiently enough to function, he sent an ultimatum to Adam. 

He **would** get Genomex back.

And he didn't want it destroyed, so he invited Adam to face him on the top of the old Weisengard building. Big and abandoned, in the middle of nowhere, no fear that any fallout might instigate anti-mutant feelings.

*****

Jesse spent his spare time working out. He didn't remember anything from the last few months, his last clear memory being of standing in Senator Langley's hallway dripping mud and dirt.

He remembered the mines, but didn't remember much about the interrogation before that. He'd thought Adam had been there, but then again he'd thought his long-deceased mother had been there too. It felt odd that home was Genomex for the time being, but with Adam working in a lab and Emma meditating in a room she'd decorated with flowers, he could kind of settle here. 

He was well aware of the need to get Shalimar and Brennan out from Eckhart's influence, and Adam promised him that day would come and soon. When they were back to par. The SGFlex that had kept his powers dormant had been removed, and Jesse never realised that he'd ever miss his powers so much. It felt good to be able to move where he wanted, or protect himself and others from harm. 

But he felt constantly filthy. Not the filth of good honest dirt, but the filth of violation. 

Emma had told him that, in the time he couldn't remember, he'd been violated repeatedly. And not to worry about it unduly, that it would come back to him to deal as and when he was ready. She'd always been spot on in the past so he didn't argue, just maybe took the odd shower or three more then necessary.

Emma had been his biggest worry. For days after they'd come here, she'd been wracked with chills and fever. Adam just said it was a withdrawal from the psionic group, that she needed to cold turkey. It had turned out that Adam was right, as per usual, but that didn't stop Jesse from hating that the older man couldn't or wouldn't help her. 

He was the one holding her while she shook herself apart, or keeping her clean while she puked violently into the toilet, and he was the one mopping her brow when the sweat was running off her in rivers. And that was just the physical side. Her nightmares implied that whatever was happening in her head was far, far worse.

Nursemaid was not something he was good at and, while he worried over Emma, he also resented that no one more, uh, qualified, was willing to help out. Especially as there was another patient. Emma had told him that Cyber was a good friend to them both. He didn't remember the kid, though, and to be honest she was just a little strange.

Same as Emma, she went through withdrawal, but hers was much shorter and milder, and as soon as she was up and about, she was never more than a couple of feet away from Jesse. Which was cute. And annoying. Especially as Cyber never, ever said a word. But then again, for the longest time, the kid was his only real lucid company. 

The rest of the staff here looked like they thought he was going to suck their brains out, Emma was just vacant a lot of the time and Adam was closeted up in his lab.

On top of that, Adam had warned him off the PC's. He balked initially, but Adam had explained that too much of his time over the last few months had been spent in VR and he needed to get rid of the light sensitivity he'd developed, as well retrain muscles and practice his fighting and power related skills. Added to that the fact that their two resident psionics were both suffering from overload, it would be a really bad idea to let Cyber anywhere near a PC for her own good.

That had worked for a while, but he was back to par and Emma could look after Cyber. Except that Emma kept losing the kid who always turned up just as he was about to log in somewhere. Aggravating and frustrating, and Jesse just wanted to get out here and kick ass. 

*****

Adam was confusing himself. He quite honestly didn't know what he wanted anymore. He had to eradicate his mistakes, make sure no more mutants were born or developed, but the destruction of the Psionic Circle had made him realise that he didn't actually hate mutants. Quite frankly, he was indifferent to most. But the seven in the Circle he'd come to know somewhat. Especially Path and Kin, and Em who he already knew. 

So when he'd met Emma and Cyber in the stairwell, he'd felt the urge to get them to safety. Jesse too, to a lesser extent. And when they'd died, he'd known. Not like Emma and Cyber had.  But like he'd lost some good friends.

And now he found that he remembered that he actually liked Jesse and Emma; even the child was endearing.

Jesse didn't seem to be able to recall anything, so he'd spoken with Emma and they'd agreed that it was best to keep him away from computers and foreign psionics, and preferably sharp objects, until they knew whether the memories were likely to come back again.

Emma herself was cold towards him, and he was well aware that she bore a passionate hatred for him, but that she needed the Sanctuary he had to offer. She'd agreed to a truce between them until such time as she was recovered and they had Shalimar back from Eckhart's clutches. It was interesting to note that she didn't mention Brennan, and Adam filed that away for another time.

When Adam received Eckhart's ultimatum, he realised that if he didn't take it up then Eckhart would try and take Genomex by force. But if he did take it up, then at least the prize would be intact for the victor, and he'd be left alone to do what he needed to do.

*****


	11. Month 10

+ Month 10 

Proxy Blue looked at her viewers in silence for a moment. "I'm not gonna bore you with the same ole same ole. But I will just say this. Keep your ears to the ground, people, cuz big things are happening. And don't forget to tell me what you hear."

*****

It was Brennan that fired the first shot.  

And Jesse that blocked it.

Six of them standing on top of the Weisengard building, a structure famous for never having been completed, with the top two stories made up of iron girders and half a flat roof, squaring off against each other. Jeff, Paulo and his men protected Charlotte, Lena and Dale in one corner, but they seemed to sense that this was not their battle.

This was a battle between long time friends and enemies.

From Eckhart's side, it was all about getting Adam either killed or captured so Charlotte could do her magic, and Genomex would be open for the taking. From Adam's it was all about getting Genomex. Neither man cared that much for their pawns; they liked them maybe, but in the end they were just pawns. 

Yet, none of the four wanted to hurt any of the others. Each wanted to get their friends and make them safe. But they each had a job to do.

And unseen in a dark corner Cyber, having stowed away in the transport, stood quiet.

Eckhart and Adam talked about Genomex for the longest time, until Adam told Emma to just knock Eckhart out. 

And Brennan fired at Adam in response.

But Jesse blocked it. 

Emma retaliated, stunning Brennan.

Shalimar leapt for Emma.

And they were squared off.

Neither wanting to hurt the other, Shalimar held back and Emma refused to use her powers, both opting for the cat-fight option. Shalimar had the natural advantage but Emma fought dirty, each trying to put the other woman out of action long enough to take down their General. Persuasive words were lost in howls and screams of pain as Paulo's men took bets.

Brennan and Jesse were involved in a stalemate, Brennan unable to get past Jesse's massed self. The molecular was fast, always moving to block him and timing his breaths to coincide with Brennan's recharges. It was almost like being back at Sanctuary, trying to take each other down. Jesse didn't have a second to waste to keep up with Brennan, no opening ever coming up to knock Brennan out of the game.  The only way to do it would be to phase him through the floor, but as he didn't want to kill the elemental all he could do was dodge and block.

But Brennan was winning the verbal war. 

Throwing at him the ideas that he'd been used and abused over the last twelve months, saying things that he didn't know if they were true or not, but would explain at least some of why he felt so dirty. And splinters of memory flashed, confirming a fragment here and there.

But that didn't mean he missed a beat, let it distract him. Not even when Brennan accused Adam of using him too, because Adam wouldn't ever do that. It was Eckhart that had brainwashed Brennan and Shalimar. 

Shalimar pinned Emma to the ground. "I don't want to hurt you, Em!"

"Don't **ever** call me that again!" Emma's eyes flashed as anger overtook her, and even though Shalimar knew it wasn't real she couldn't help clawing at her throat as the noose tightened, suffocating her. 

Suffocating, drowning in blood, not again, never again. 

Instead of fighting her fear, she reached beyond that to find her strength and lashed out, catching Emma behind the knees, and the illusion vanished, Emma was stunned, and before the telempath could recover, Shalimar had her in a back breaking neck-lock. 

"You don't wanna hit me with anything right now, kiddo, 'cause if I get startled, your spine is so much jello."

Emma's cry almost distracted Jesse for a second, but his temper was riding as high as Brennan's own. With everything the elemental was feeling, he just wanted give it everything he had, but Jesse didn't deserve that, no matter how deluded he was. And besides, he'd didn't really know how much the molecular's massed form could take. 

But he knew that Jesse was holding back too, knew that he could be lying a hundred feet below, or out of it with a crushed skull from a massed fist. They were both playing for stalemate and that was what they were getting. That had to end, but he'd tried the verbal assault as soon as he'd picked up on the surprised look that passed so fast across Jesse's face when he'd mentioned being Langley's lapdog, like he didn't know. But when he wanted, Jesse's walls could be as solid as his massed form, and after the initial surprise that was exactly what the molecular had done. 

So Brennan prepared to take the biggest chance he'd ever done, take the risk that this time he'd get it right, built the energy up and timed it to Jesse's breath. Waited until the other man massed, then hit him long and hard, not with everything, but making his flow of electricity grow bigger and harder, pushing Jesse back, moving them off the battlefield, opening the door to get to Adam. Yet, he had to work hard to retain some kind of tenuous control on so much power, he needed to shut off before Jesse had to take breath, yet after they'd moved far enough away. 

Then Jesse changed, switched from mass to phase. But perhaps he miscalculated how quickly he could do it, or maybe Brennan had thought Jesse could hold it longer - it wasn't like he actually had a stopwatch on him.

Whatever the problem, Jesse flew backwards in a shower of sparks and was left groaning on his hands and knees. And with Emma down, the way was open to take Adam down.

"Now," said Adam reasonably, "you wouldn't want to hurt a kid, would you?"

Brennan backed off, wondering where the girl had come from. "Shit, Adam, I actually believe Eckhart's crap now," he said, somewhat taken aback.

"I take it you had some doubts, Mr Mulwray," said Eckhart. "And you didn't deign to share them? For shame."

"I always have doubts," Brennan replied, "so don't let it go to your head. What happens now?"

"Now, Adam gives me Genomex and I leave you children to sort your own squabbles out."

"Not on your life," Adam replied. "You can do what you like, but I'm not giving you squat. I'll stop these freaks if it's the last thing I do!"

"Charlotte!" Eckhart called, but Adam shook his head. 

"Oh no, you're not having her touch me!" He backed away towards the works lift, the girl in front of him, and hit the down button.

"After him!" They started after him, but suddenly Emma and Jesse were between them and the car that was just disappearing.

"Like hell!" spat Jesse, and Brennan waved him aside, striding towards them.

"Come off it, Jess, I –" 

He fell, pole-axed, and Emma's triumphant smile was full of malice.

"Don't follow us," said Jesse calmly. "He's ours to deal with."

"We all need to fix this," Shalimar said, trying to draw nearer. "It's not just you guys."

"Yes, it is," said Jesse. "This is for me and Emma to fix."

Shalimar started forward, but Jesse phased the floor. Below there was a mishmash of iron girders, flooring and steel support spikes sticking up, and the gap was too big. So she waited till Jesse had to let the floor go, let it spring back.

Jesse backed off from the phased area, and it stayed. He grinned at her complete shock then grabbed Emma's hand, phased them both and jumped. 

There was a few seconds of stunned silence before the floor suddenly snapped back.

Looking over the edge, Shalimar was just in time to see Emma and Jesse climb from the top of the car to two floors below.

Running across to the diagonally opposite corner, she dived down the stairwell there, hearing Lena ask, "Where did Dale go?"

Emma and Jesse made their way over the abandoned works, catching glimpses of Adam as he headed towards the stairwell at the opposite side. Surely the man must realise that Eckhart's crew would be there before him, so surely he had a plan.

Giggling, Emma saw any plan Adam may have had vanish when Cyber, pissed at being separated from Jesse, bit him hard enough that Adam roared in pain. Hard enough that Adam lashed out and sent her flying into the base of a column. 

She heard Jesse curse and felt her own anger flare, along with all the other things she'd deliberately repressed. This was the man who had betrayed her, put her through all that pain, and the one who she blamed, perhaps not directly, but certainly indirectly, for taking her away from the Circle. What seemed like a long time ago, she'd promised the Circle that Adam would die once his use was over, and now was the time. He would not use or destroy her or her kind again. She simply would not permit it.

They stopped briefly to check on Cyber, the sight of so much blood horrific under any circumstance, let alone pouring from the skull of one so young. Emma couldn't feel her anymore, and Jesse couldn't find a pulse. And their rage grew out of all rational proportion.

They cornered Adam near the stairwell. He looked frightened but they didn't care. Concentrating, Emma made him feel caged, locked in. Shackles as effectively real as iron. There was something not quite right about it, but her anger and hatred outshone any second thought. She left the final decision to Jesse, though, the one who'd been used most.

Jesse could feel the rage in Emma. She wasn't pushing it at him or making him feel it, it was just there for anyone to feel, and he chose to let it take him along too, because everything had come crashing back.  It wasn't just the drugs, Adam **had** been there at the interrogation. Adam had seen him when Vic- Langley'd had him. Adam had even been to some of her functions and humiliated him, boasted how he'd used Jesse's trust in him to bring down Cyberteam. They were all there in his head - Langley and Morrisen, both using and abusing in their own ways, and finally Adam, abusing his trust, using the fact that he didn't remember. Emma hadn't enlightened him either, but she'd her own problems, he'd seen that for himself. 

And they had the man now in front of them, once friend, father and mentor, now betrayer and violator and the man who wanted to destroy his creations. The man, who seemed unmoved that he'd just left a little girl lying unconscious, yet was clearly frightened for his own life. Well, he should be - the creations were fighting back.

Burning rage stoked higher. He already counted himself a killer, had done so since he'd first stood by and watched two other manipulators die right in front of him. Burning, surging, pulling at the bit, he'd known it was the right thing to do, and he'd done it since in the line of duty. 

"Please, you don't want to kill him, trust me, you don't." Adam's voice was uncharacteristically pleading.

"Should have thought about that before you destroyed us," he said, and phased the floor, watching detachedly side by side with Emma, the pair of them emotionless as Adam fell screaming to his death.

Shalimar was the first to approach them, her face white with shock. Brennan, still shaky but mobile, had gone with Lena downstairs to see what was left.

And Adam - the real Adam - was behind Emma and Jesse, cradling the moaning girl with Charlotte on his arm. She'd touched him less than a moment after he'd sent the girl flying, when he realised what he'd done. With Brennan's help they'd resuscitated the child, but that small relief amidst so much shock to his system became insignificant as they followed the impassioned appeal from near the stairwell. Picking the girl up gently, they'd hurried over and Adam felt a gut-wrenching shell shock as they all stared at the empty spot where Dale had begged them not to do it.

*****


	12. Month 11

+ Month 11 

"Good news, kiddies," Proxy Blue started up. "I have it on good authority that the remaining battling factions have resolved their issues. No more midnight fireworks, at least not of the kind we don't like. 

"Rebuilding is moving apace, and most of the national grid is back online without the need for mutant batteries. That's all I got for now, and don't forget, if you think the people need to know, then let me know."

*****

Lena switched off the link and looked around her. They'd all moved into Genomex on both Adam and Eckhart's insistence, so she had a good system now. But she was finding it hard not to get depressed. They were all walking wounded, and some had wounds that were more raw than others. 

And then there was Darius. He'd been gone for over a year, vanished into the system and she'd been too concerned over her own survival and their cause to have made much more than token attempts to find him.  But in an effort to avoid the urge to crawl into a hole and just give up, she'd started taking a serious crack at searching him out, with no leads so far.

The only bright spark in her life was Cyber, the mute girl who only really came alive, was only able to speak and show when she was in cyberspace. Whenever she was online, Cyber was right there with her, sitting on her lap as she typed, or sharing headspace when she was in VR.

But the girl was also bonded with the blond boy and didn't like to leave him for long. Lena was actually grateful that Jesse kept pushing Cyber away; it could only be good in the long run. But her heart broke when he vanished for long days and the child kept watch for him from a window, refusing to move even for a spot of cyber-surfing until he was back in the building.

On those days Lena kept her company, read with her and played. They had long one-sided conversations, and if it weren't for her need to find Darius and run Proxy, she might've considered looking out for Cyber. It wasn't as if the girl had family left willing to claim her for their own.

Maybe she'd just make sure she went to a good home.

*****

Jesse couldn't stand to be in company for long. He kept feeling their eyes on him, judging and accusing even when they weren't.  And he'd walked in on more than one conversation they'd been having about him, heard that awkward silence that happens when no one wants to admit they were talking behind your back. 

He didn't know what they were saying, though, and it ate away at already exposed and raw nerves. 

Emma had been the worst. He honestly thought she was with him. They'd murdered that mutant together, yet she seemed to be handling things so much better than him. She'd sat by him, pulled him round so she could look him straight in the eyes.

"It's a matter of perspective," Emma told him matter of factly, almost ruthlessly. "**We **killed Adam. He knows now that we'd do it again if we had to, and that's enough. That's all there is to it. **You** murdered that mutant. Because you can't separate the two. You've heard the others say it. All he'd have to have done was shifted shape and we would have stopped. It was an accident. And anyway, it's not like we actually knew the guy."

"But the others did, and the intent was there," Jesse had protested.

"What, you didn't want to destroy him?"

"I did, but…"

"It was an accident, Jesse, one that could have been avoided. If it happened again, my intent would not change. How about yours?"

He'd not been able to answer then. 

"Grow up, Jesse, we're not kids anymore and it's not an ideal world out there, you know that with all you've been through. None of us can ever be the same, and you need to decide whether you're going to spend your life regretting the mistakes or appreciating your own efforts. Because believe me, the world is only too happy to help you do the former, but no one will do the latter for you."

Jesus, but she'd grown so cold. Although she was right. He had to figure out where he was going. He'd needed to get out, had borrowed a car for a day, or sometimes a couple of days, just to get away.

Especially from Shalimar and Brennan. Those two were thick as thieves these days. Brennan blanked him when he could and sniped when he couldn't. Shalimar kept starting to say something, started to put her hand on his arm, but always pulled away like she couldn't stand to. 

Adam was never around at all, which was probably a good thing.

He walked miles through busy streets and empty countryside. Contemplated the idea of targeting one of these innocents to see if he could kill them out of hand. Found that he couldn't even stomach the idea. Concluded that Emma had a point.

Conceded that he had to put himself first. That if he admitted every violation that was done to him, then he had every right to be the bleeding wreck on the outside that he was on the inside. But he was stronger than that, had already proven it to himself in the dark of night with a razor blade that had gone back into its case as pristine as it had come out. There was no one else who needed to know, or he needed to prove it to.

What did remain for him to do was face down the others like Emma was doing with such seeming success, and thereby ensure that no one would use him again. He'd had the power once, more power than he'd known what to do with. He could have it again.

*****

Shalimar felt very alone, finding herself growing closer to Brennan since he was the only one there. Paulo had offered her his shoulder once but Charlotte, although she tried to be understanding, was also very possessive, something she knew that Paulo would love.  And she was happy for him. 

Of course she was sad about Dale, sad that s/he'd never really had an opportunity to live for hirself. She'd understood that Dale had only tried to help, the way s/he did best. To some, hir death might have been pointless, but to her it had prevented Adam's, and that was a sacrifice that some might consider have been worth making. As far as she was concerned that had yet to be proven, but she was willing to keep an open mind. For Dale's sake.

Jesse, she just didn't know what to say to him. She could see the raw pain he was in, but didn't know how to make it go away, didn't know how to make the blood stop crawling over her when she went to reassure, hug him. 

He seemed to reach a decision at some point and the pain went away, to be replaced by something colder and harder, and she still couldn't touch him.

Emma plain scared her. There was nothing left of the sweet mischievous child she'd known before. And while Emma was still happy to do girl talk, there was always a dark undercurrent that she couldn't quite place. And with her too, there was the blood. Though not so strong, but perhaps that was because she never felt the urge touch this Emma.

As much as she was growing closer to Brennan, more because he was just **there** than anything else, she was finding it difficult to know what he was feeling. Initially he'd been angry, shouting at Jesse and Emma, lashing out whenever he could. Jesse had just taken it, withdrawing in on himself, while hurt defiance sparked in his haunted eyes. Emma, on the other hand, had spit back accusations of betrayal in return and they'd almost had a major war occurring in the canteen.

Having talked with Emma, Shalimar now knew where the younger woman was coming from. She thought her misguided, but not having been there herself she'd had to accept that Emma had felt betrayed by both Brennan and Dale.

Brennan himself had seemed to calm down after the initial anger had burned out. But still he refused to talk to either Emma or Jesse.

And Adam looked positively ill the few times she'd seen him. Working himself into the ground, it seemed to her, and running away as fast as his IQ points could carry him.

Shalimar felt as though she were being split apart. And guilty too. Because she'd chosen Brennan over Jesse once, and now it seemed she was committed to repeating that whether she liked it or not.

*****

Brennan didn't know what to think. Sure he'd been seriously pissed about Dale. S/he'd been annoying as all hell, but endearing too. Kinda like a team mascot. And not much more than a kid. He wasn't even sure who he was mad at, Jesse and Emma, Dale, or himself.

But with Shalimar's observations that Jesse, Emma and Adam weren't dealing well themselves, and reassurance that he wasn't to blame, he'd taken a step back. 

Adam, he was indifferent to. Didn't really know what to feel. Didn't really understand the whole moral polarity thing. He hadn't been brainwashed or had someone in his head telling him what to do. Adam not dealing well was Adam's lookout as far he was concerned. He'd deal with the man as and when he had to.

Emma wasn't Emma anymore and while, in a way, he mourned that loss, he also respected the mature and hard-edged woman she was turning into. And Jesse just plain left him off-balance, so much so that he felt the need to push him away. The younger man was becoming darker somehow, stronger, and he felt just a bit threatened by it.

*****

Emma found herself getting frustrated by those around her. They were all so easy to read, easy to manipulate if she so wanted.  She kept herself from doing so, but just the knowledge that she could made her contemptuous of them.

She worked hard to build her mental shields up, having been spoiled by the combined shielding she'd had in the Circle. But being as determined as she was never to be subject to others whims, it didn't take her long to be in a position where she could reach out without too much fear of someone reaching back in.

Not being able to read people's minds, put actual thoughts there, make them do things directly, or hallucinate, move object telekinetically, all these things, left a big hole in her, one she filled with a need to have more power in her own field, to attain fine control of it. And a dark need to control others and make them do her bidding.

Because that was what she was designed to do, and she just couldn't deny it any longer.

As she felt Jesse get stronger, make himself colder and harder, she sensed an ally there. Not in the way he'd wanted initially, but in a mutual understanding of the need not to let anyone use them again. She thought about offering to help and teach him to raise mental shields of his own to seal an alliance. He was no psionic, but she could teach him to feel it, to know when someone was trying to get in. Of course, she'd leave a backdoor for herself and expected no less from him in turn.

Shalimar was, well, Shalimar, and always would be, and that was cool, that would keep her grounded more than anything else. She felt a new fear in the feral, didn't need to read her to sense it, one that undermined her natural tactile nature and compassion. But, whatever Shalimar might think, it was healing slowly but surely.

She'd had her petty revenge on Brennan, and bore him no particular hatred now, but she found it very difficult to relate to him, settling for the mutual trading of sometimes viciously barbed insults.

And Adam. Poor guilt-ridden, weak and ineffectual Adam. Jesse had no idea how strong he was inside; given how much he'd been through, he made Adam's efforts to be strong seem pitiful and pathetic. Again, she bore no hatred for the man, not anymore. But unlike Brennan who couldn't help his inadequacies, even worked to rise above them and better himself, Adam had always touted himself as more intelligent than that. And he was, in certain areas. But not here and now.

One day, Adam would wake up and find himself utterly alone in the world, and wouldn't be able to comprehend why.

One good thing that warmed her frozen heart was seeing Jeff again.  She was sorry that Julie hadn't turned up, but Jeff reminded her of the good she'd done before. Alongside Shalimar's friendship, he stopped her from giving in completely to her darker side.

*****

Adam couldn't face himself in the mirror, let alone any of the others. He'd been through this once before, but last time he'd done little that couldn't be easily forgiven. This time he'd done or caused so much more damage that forgiveness was a word he wouldn't hear from anyone anytime soon, least of all himself.

He felt guilty for Dale's death, of that there was no doubt. But if he were honest, hir death was just the last in a long, long line of death and suffering that he'd caused, whether directly or indirectly, and there was no getting over that.

And he'd betrayed almost every one of his children.

Except Shalimar. She was the only one who looked at him with pity instead of scorn, and he wasn't sure if that wasn't worse, because he didn't deserve it.

Sure he'd been under an influence, and exercised bad judgement.  But Charlotte's powers couldn't create what wasn't already there; she only reversed the polarity of what a person was already capable of, skewed the moral compass, as it were.

The bottom line was that even now, clear of any influence, he was capable of doing it all again. It just required the right stimulus. And that horrified him more than the deeds he'd actually done.

He looked at his team - or the team he still thought of as his - and none of them were the same team that he used to know. They'd all grown up, lost their innocence, even Brennan who would swear blind he'd had no innocence to start off with.

And he was responsible for that.

Which was why he was hiding out under the guise of building a new Sanctuary. One geared towards helping mutants integrate into society, relocating those that needed the help, and placing those that had trouble controlling their mutancy with those that could help them.

Making reparation.

*****

Mason Eckhart was feeling rather… chirpy. There really was no other word for it. The dermal regenerator, rapid fluid intake and a new supply of dermal covering, and he both looked and felt so much **cleaner** than he had in far, far too long. While he would never admit it out loud, the relief from the constant pain of rotting skin was almost exhilarating.

But what cheered him the most was the agreement he'd struck with Adam. One in which he felt he came out satisfactorily on top.

Not only was Genomex his, which he'd demanded from the outset, but Adam had generously given him LexMor too. No doubt to help assuage his guilt, but who was he to refuse?

There was no doubt that the remainder of Morrisen Industries that Adam had appropriated immediately after his abrupt death would ironically go towards the maintenance and running of Sanctuary. And the condition for Eckhart's unequivocal takeover was merely the accommodation of team members and support in rebuilding Sanctuary, all of which, given the indignities and sacrifices he'd had to make recently, he gladly capitulated to - although he'd never have let Adam or anyone else know that, preferring to bitch about it instead. It might make them get out quicker, too.

He called a meeting of all of them, as agreed with Adam, to inform them of the situation, and to advise them that he would be moving into LexMor until such time as they'd vacated the premises. And as a parting gift, he left the box of rings on the table. "For better or worse you're back together now, and may I say how much you deserve each other. Now I must dash. Goodbye."

Eckhart strode out of the room and directly out of Genomex, leaving everyone to stare at the box without anyone venturing to touch it.

Lena decided to break the silence. She told them of the forgotten political prisoners held in remand at a facility across state.  Told them that she had reason to believe that Darius might be among them, but with only numbers to identify them, she had no way of knowing and had exhausted her resources trying to find a place where name might be matched up with number. Asked them to just go look, see if he was there, in which case she could launch an appeal.

"Sure," Shalimar volunteered, "I'll go look." She wouldn't stand for caging the innocent.

"Right by your side," agreed Brennan, predictably.

"My gun is always yours, Chiquita," Paulo volunteered to Charlotte's frown.

"No," said Emma. "It should be us five. Paulo, thank you for volunteering, the gesture is appreciated. But guys, we have a problem." They all listened, mostly because they didn't know what else to do. "None of us know what to do with ourselves now. Some of us don't want to be here, but we don't have anywhere else to go. Some of us don't know if we could ever look the others in the eye, much less work together. We need to find out, and I think a simple recon mission will help us each decide that. "

"Speak for yourself, Emma," Jesse said with an insolent grin.  "I have somewhere to go."

"You're thinking about Cyberteam, aren't you?" Shalimar said, looking at her clasped hands on the table.

"So what if I am? Won't take that many modifications to make it legit."

"Jess, Emma's right. I understand that you, that maybe you think it's best you leave, but I want… would like for us to give being a family again one more shot. Because that's what we are, and I don't… I need you guys, all of you." With that last, she raised her eyes to look directly at Adam, who was shaking his head before she was finished.

"No, no way. You don't need me for something like this, you could do it with your eyes shut."

"You're missing the point, Adam," Brennan added. "It's not what the mission is that's important. It's the fact that Shal wants us – "

"And what Shalimar wants, Shalimar gets!" Adam retorted and Shalimar flinched.

"Hey, she's been in your corner all along, so don't you dare attack her!" Brennan snapped, standing up so fast his chair tipped over.

"Shut up both of you!" It was Shalimar's turn to shout and rounded on a startled Brennan first. "You are not my protector, boyfriend, keeper or father, so don't you dare presume to fight my battles for me!" Heated glare turned to Adam. "You need to stop being so damned selfish and get your ass out of that hole you're in and face up to what happened. Because like it or not, it did - so deal with it. 

"And don't you look so damned smug, Emma. Where do you get off being so superior all the time? I know you had it rough, but so did we all one way or another. Get over yourself, already.  And Jesse, I know you're trying real hard to be strong, but you're trying so fucking hard you're gonna break something. Talk to someone outside of all of this. See a shrink or something, but stop building walls." She paused and softened a bit.

"I guess I should include myself too. But, you know what? I'm tired of beating myself up for not being able to make you guys happy, or even deal with my own problems. I know it's not gonna be easy and oh God, this is all just so cliché, but we **are** family.  We came back together in the end, didn't we? And even real families change through age and experience, without losing touch.  So why can't we be the same?" She looked around, then slumped back to the table and moaned loudly, "Oh God, I just did 'Mom' again, didn't I?"

"Yup," said Jesse, with a weak grin, "and just because you did it so well, I think I'll come along and make sure you don't start doing inappropriate 'Mom' stuff."

"Does that make me 'Dad'?" Adam asked tentatively.

"Like hell," said Brennan, trying hard not to smile. "With what she just said? That's me. You get to be the French 'odd' Stewart one."

"And that would make Emma 'The Head'," said Jesse and at Emma's evil look, raised his hands in defence. "Guess I'll shut up now before some smart ass labels me the 'desperate to get laid' kid."

"If the shoe's too big," Emma suddenly giggled, and even Adam cracked a smile.

****


	13. Month 12

+ Month 12 

Proxy Blue regarded her viewers with a positively wolfishly snarky grin, her colours as bright and changeable as they used to be a very long time ago. "You people know how to make a girl proud. With anti-mutant protests and behaviour on the decline, we can lump the whole debacle in with racism, sexism and all the other –isms, the minorities fight every day; no more, and no less. And there's even a support group for misfit mutants and humans who just can't seem to get along with the mutant next door. You can find more information and website URLs at Proxy's usual links page.

"LexMor has been shuffled into what can tentatively be called the Genomex Group, and has secured the government contract for genetic R&D. Like that was a surprise.  Can you spell 'Monopoly'?

"The security agency in charge of the Stacklin Detention Centre has back peddled, accepting full responsibility for the mass breakout in light of the fact that the inmates were political detainees of the infamous Inner Circle, held indefinitely without trial. Apparently they couldn't help themselves.

"One last little mutant related point. All of you nasty little hacks out there that are trying to blame the whole war on the Prozac Syndrome and the so-called Psionic Circle, take a look at the chronology.  It was all down to human nature. And don't you mutants start going all smug, because you have that very same human nature. I dare you to deny it.

"On a more personal note, with the mutants out of the closet and things more or less getting back to normal, this gal is running out of news bigger than 'that mutant ate my sheep'. So, we're expanding our horizons and looking to pastures anew." Here Proxy Blue paused for a very long beat. "You may remember some sixty odd years ago a popular rumour about a little nowhere place by the name of Roswell. You know what I'm talking about, true believers, and I'm not looking for lights in the sky or alien abductions, but if you have gossip on exactly who did what to whom and why in order to cover up the stuff that was never covered up, than drop me a line."

*****

The new Sanctuary had been built on the old. It was only a shell for the moment, some basic accommodation for a dozen people at present, yet held just five.

Paulo had taken his men back home with Charlotte, who had ambitious plans to make him a respectable gentleman of note. Not only had Darius been in Stacklin, but also a blue haired girl named Darlene as well as Julie, much to Jeff's delight, and it was they who volunteered to take Cyber on under her given name, Sarah.

The Kilmartin fortune, integrated into Morrisen Industries, was put back where it belonged with the sole heir, and Cyberteam profits were joined with Morrisen profits and used to maintain Sanctuary.

The five people left in residence had found an uneasy truce. The banter was back, in fits and starts, but it was interspersed with awkward silences that thankfully grew fewer as time went by. They were more a collection of individuals at this point, but anyone who had known them from back in the old days could see that slowly they were drawing together again.

The coms systems were back up and running, and though Adam considered making new devices, he thought he'd offer the rings once more. He could modify them to work with the new systems and they were somehow symbolic. But then again they were the past and he wanted to forget the past, to move on. 

In the end, the modifications provided the solution to his dilemma.  He needed to weld a slim copper filament in, and although he could have had it folded inside the metal of the rings, instead he had it inlaid in the surface. 

The silver metal bands as they had been and always would be, representative of the family they were, come hell or high water, bisected by the copper line of blood and the hell they'd been through, that had split them apart and brought them back together. The same, yet different. More.

They had a little party with a bottle of champagne to celebrate the fact that they'd all taken their rings back, to celebrate the fact that Mutant X was back. With a different agenda, to be sure, with a different future and different people, but the family remained the same, united despite the differences. 

Shalimar couldn't stop hugging everyone, while Brennan boasted his prowess on the basketball court that day, and Adam talked excitedly about plans. Slightly outside the louder, more extrovert three, Emma and Jesse looked at each other across the room, raising their glasses with a smile passing between them. Friendly and gentle to the passing glance, but on closer examination his was perhaps a little colder than the old Jesse might have given, and hers with maybe just a hint of malevolence.

FINIS 


End file.
